Delhi High Court Rules Suit Over Online Alleged Defamation Must Be Filed In Mumbai Under Tejpal Principles

A Single Judge of the Delhi High Court, Justice Purushaindra Kumar Kaurav, heard a suit by an Indian Revenue Service officer seeking permanent injunction and damages against multiple defendants, including a film production house and an online streaming platform, for allegedly defamatory content in a web series. The principal question before the Court was whether the Delhi forum had territorial jurisdiction under Section 19 of the Civil Procedure Code to entertain a claim for online defamation, and whether the principles laid down in Escorts Ltd. v. Tejpal Singh Sisodia (Tejpal) governed the determination.

The Court held that it lacked jurisdiction and returned the plaint for presentation before the competent court in Mumbai. The decision affirmed the Merger Rule and the Maximum Wrong Rule articulated in Tejpal and stressed that jurisdiction must exist on the date of institution of the suit. The Court, in its reasoning, observed: “With the main contesting defendants residing in Mumbai, the plaintiff himself being a resident of Mumbai, and further the wrong, as per the plaintiff’s own plaint, having also occurred at Mumbai, the Merger Rule of Tejpal applies with full force. The jurisdiction to entertain the present suit, lies only with the courts in Mumbai.” The judgment noted that questions of merit did not arise once the threshold of jurisdiction was not crossed.

Background The plaintiff, an IRS officer formerly posted with the Narcotics Control Bureau in Mumbai and then serving in Chennai, claimed that Episode 1 of the series “The Ba***ds of Bollywood,” produced by one defendant and streamed by another, contained defamatory material referring to him between 32:02 and 33:50 minutes. He alleged reputation loss across India, including Delhi, and sought injunctions and damages. Defendants challenged maintainability, arguing that the principal defendants and the alleged wrongful acts were in Mumbai and that the plaint sought to forum-shop by impleading an entity linked to Delhi.

Counsel for the defendants relied on Tejpal to submit that, under Section 19 CPC, a plaintiff could not choose a forum where the defendant also resided if the wrong was done in the defendant’s forum (the Merger Rule). The plaintiff argued that the series was promoted and accessed in Delhi, that consequential harm to his career and pending proceedings in Delhi justified Delhi jurisdiction, and that a particular defendant’s online posts in Delhi supported maintainability.

The Court analysed Section 19 and the Tejpal framework at length, emphasising that the tort of defamation requires publication to third parties who knew the plaintiff and that publication on the internet did not ipso facto create a wrong everywhere. The judgment reproduced Tejpal’s formulation: “Wrong to the person of the plaintiff by libel would be done not by the mechanical act of tweeting by the defendant ... but by communication thereof to at least one person other than the plaintiff or the defendant and knowing the plaintiff and in whose esteem, the plaintiff would fall by reading the defamatory tweets.” Applying those principles, the Court found that the plaintiff’s own pleadings admitted publication and effects in Mumbai and that the attempt to rely on an improperly described Delhi entity appeared designed to evade Tejpal’s rigours. The Court returned the plaint to the plaintiff to be filed, if so advised, in a court of competent jurisdiction in Mumbai and disposed of pending applications, while granting liberty to apply under Order VII Rule 10A CPC for appropriate directions.

Case No.: CS (OS) 698/2025, I.A. No. 24508/2025, I.A. No. 24510/2025 & I.A. No. 28922/2025 Case Title: Sameer Dnyandev Wankhede v. Red Chillies Entertainments Pvt. Ltd. & Ors. Appearances: For the Petitioner(s): Mr. J. Sai Deepak, Senior Advocate with Ms. Shaktiki Sharma, Ms. Purnima Vashishtha, Mr. Jatin Parashar, Mr. Rohit Bhagat, Mr. Kunal Vats, Ms. Aprajita, Ms. Tanya Arora and Mr. Sanyam, Advocates. For the Respondent(s): Mr. Neeraj Kishan Kaul and Ms. Shyel Trehan, Senior Advocates with Mr. Janay Jain, Ms. Monisha Mane Bhangale, Ms. Bijal Vora, Ms. Rhea Rao, Mr. Ashutosh Agarwal, Mr. Pranav Sarthi, Mr. Rohan Poddar, Ms. Vidhi Jain, Mr. Ayush Raj, Ms. Prachi Dhingra, Mr. Udit Bajpai and Mr. Utkarsh Vatsa (for D1); Mr. Angad Makkar and Mr. Raghav Goyal (for D2); Mr. Rajiv Nayyar, Senior Advocate with Mr. Saikrishna Rajagopal, Mr. Sidharth Chopra, Ms. Sneha Jain and Mr. Devrat Joshi (for D2); Mr. Ankit Parhar with Mr. Tejpal Singh Rathore, Mr. Abhishek Kumar and Ms. Sanchi Sethi (for D3); Ms. Mamta R. Jha with Mr. Rohan Ahuja and Mshruttima (for D4); Ms. Amee Rana with Mr. Thejesh Rajendran and Mr. Tanuj Sharma (for D5); Mr. Sankalp Udgata with Mr. Jeevan Ballav Panda (for D6).