Ilaiyaraaja urges Madras High Court to prevent use of his songs in movie ‘Dude’

The Madras High Court, on Wednesday (November 26, 2025), reserved orders on a plea by acclaimed musician R. Ilaiyarajaa to restrain Hyderabad-based Mythri Movie Makers, the producers of Tamil movie Dude, from continuing to exhibit the movie, in any medium, including OTT platforms, along with the songs ‘Nooru Varusham’ and ‘Karutha Machan’ that were composed by him for other movies in the past.

Justice N. Senthilkumar deferred his orders on the interim injunction application pursuant to a civil suit filed by the composer seeking a permanent injunction and a mandatory injunction directing the production house to immediately take down all unauthorised content related to the plaintiff’s copyright works and also disclose the profits derived so far by wrongful exploitation of the two songs in the movie Dude.

Senior counsel S. Prabakaran, representing the composer, argued that the respondent Mythri Movie Makers was in the habit of using the songs composed by the plaintiff in its movies without seeking his permission. He said, the same production house had used four of his client’s songs in Ajith Kumar-starrer Good Bad Ugly (GBU) forcing his client to obtain an interim injunction against that movie.

He said the same production house had once again used two other songs of Mr. Ilaiyaraaja in its latest movie Dude, starring Pradeep Ranganathan and Mamitha Baiju. Intervening during the arguments, the judge, in a lighter vein, said, the latest trend among movie makers appeared to be the use of old songs in their new movies, and such a trend was giving rise to claims of copyright violations.

‘Does it not give popularity?‘

“When your old songs get used in a new version, is it not popularity that you get for your songs?” the judge asked Mr. Prabakaran, who replied that the problem was with the mutilation of the songs composed by his client. He insisted on an interim injunction since the movie Dude had completed its run in cinema theatres but was still being telecast on the OTT platform along with his client’s songs.

On the other hand, when senior counsel P.V. Balasubramaniam, representing Mythri Movie Makers, which had filed a caveat, commenced his arguments, the judge asked: “Why are you continuously infringing the plaintiff’s copyrights as claimed by him?” Replying to it, the senior counsel said, his client had obtained the rights from Sony Music, which was now holding the copyright for both the songs.

Stating that Mr. Ilaiyarajaa had composed those two songs before certain amendments were made to the Copyright Act of 1957, he said, as per the pre-amended provisions, the first owner of the copyright was only the producer of the movies for which Mr. Ilaiyaraaja had composed the two songs, ‘Nooru Varusham’ and ‘Karutha Machan’, and those producers had sold the rights to Sony Music.

When a counsel for Sony Music attempted to make his submissions, the judge said he could not hear him since the music label was not a party to the suit. “It would not be appropriate to hear you when you are not a party to the case,” the judge told the counsel.