‘Don’t want to hide the names’: Rahman agrees to give credit for Ponniyin Selvan-II song to Junior Dagar Brothers

On Friday, Singhvi told the bench, also comprising Justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul M Pancholi, that “in deference to what fell from” the court, “I made a formulation which meets the ends of justice till the trial.”

Advocates Neel Mason and Arjun Harkauli, appearing for the Ustad, requested that the full names of the maestros be mentioned instead of just “Junior Dagar Brothers”.

“That can always be done, they are celebrated persons,” said Justice Bagchi.

Singhvi, too, agreed and said, “This will come in a slide, we will put it. Don’t want to hide the names. That’s not the object.” He, however, said “the other side” should not “keep on adding to their prayers”.

Accepting Singhvi’s submission, the court said in the order, “As an interim arrangement, on all OTT and online platforms, the slide depicting the credits in respect of the subject shown shall read, ‘composition inspired from the Dagarwani tradition Dhrupad, first recorded as ‘Shiv Stuti’ by late Ustad Nasir Faiyazuddin Dagar and Ustad Nasir Zahiruddin Dagar, popularly known as Junior Dagar brothers’.”

Singhvi also urged the court to make it clear that it is not tinkering with the order except for that substitution.

Accordingly, the bench added in the order, “Since we have not expressed any prima facie opinion on merits, all the issues are left open for the parties to be agitated in the civil suit.” It said that the order of the HC Single Bench and Division Bench shall “stand modified to the extent above”.

According to Ustad, his late father and uncle, Ustad N Faiyazuddin Dagar and Ustad N Zahiruddin Dagar, respectively, known as the Junior Dagar Brothers, had composed and rendered an original composition called “Shiva Stuti” in the 1970s. The composition was sung by the duo at the Royal Tropical Institute in Amsterdam in 1978 and was recorded and affixed in a CD by a music label called PAN Records. He claimed that “this fixation as per law was proof of copyright authorship and ownership” and “there is no evidence on record of any prior performance of the same musical composition.”

Rahman “admittedly had access to the…composition” and “utilised” it in his sound recording titled “Veera Raja Veera” in the movie Ponniyin Selvan -II which was released around April 2023, the petitioner stated.