Rs.1 crore legal notice to Amitabh Bachchan for sharing poem on Twitter

Megastar Amitabh Bachchan is facing a Rs. 1 crore legal notice for copy write violation on social networking website. The veteran actor, on May 24, shared a poem on his Twitter handle, without taking consent of the original author. In fact, instead of crediting the author, he credited the person who had sent him the poem.

Jagbir Rathee, Rohtak based haryanvi poet and director, was the original author of the poem. He told Mail Today, “It was the morning of May 25 when I was informed by a student that Amitabh Bachchan had praised a person named Vikas Dubey for the poem 'Court me kutta'. It was a big hit as it was liked by 1.72 lakh people, shared by 16,000 fans and commented by thousands. I immediately posted a comment on Big B's timeline and also tweeted the same. Surprisingly, the star rather than correcting the name deleted my comments”.

Rathee says that he even commented on his tweet that Big B has credited the wrong person but his comments were deleted. He, then, decided to go to his office and address the issue and shared his e-mail ID to further discuss this grievance; but his efforts did not bear fruits. “I scanned the cover, index and the poem from my collection titled Maati Ka Chulha (soil stove) that was published in 2006 while immediately mailing and posting it on Facebook besides tweeting the same but all that was of no avail”, added Rathee. Consequently, a legal notice was served to the Piku star, charging him against “criminal act like offence under copyright act, defamation under IPC and a violation under law of compensation”. Big B might also have to pay legal compensation worth Rs. 1 crore for “damage of his reputation and career as a poet”.