Celebrity Personality Rights Entail a Huge Social Cost: An Analysis

The aim of this paper is to critically analyse the concept of celebrity rights. The law on celebrity rights is still at the developing stage at India as there’s no legislation dealing with it. Judicial pronouncements have become the guiding source for the same. This lacuna has raised several questions such as: what is the scope of protection of these rights? whether they fall under privacy or should they also be linked with property rights? etc. The aim of this paper is not to argue that celebrities should not be given this right but to assess the social impacts if these rights are strictly enforced against people. An evident effect of excessive celebrity right enforcement would be restricted freedom on speech and expression in the entertainment industry which deals with celebrities, while also restricting freedom to do business to an extent. It would also lead to litigious environment which would worsen the inequalities as celebrities hold more power and resources In the end there’s a need to balance the celebrity rights (often linked with privacy) and freedom of speech and expression which is protected under the Indian constitution. Celebrity rights would entail huge social costs depending on the different contexts. As long as there are exceptions to celebrity rights such as fair use or transformative use, public information etc granting these rights may not turn out to be burdensome and problematic.