K A VENUGOPALA SETTY Vs. SURYAKANTHA U KAMATH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal is preferred against the judgment Decree dated 5-10-1979 passed by the learned Additional District Judge, Bangalore, in O. S. No. 9/1975. The appellant is the defendant in the suit and the respondent is the plaintiff. The respondent-plaintiff filed the aforesaid suit for a permanent injunction restraining the defendant either himself or through his agent etc. from further printing and publishing the book titled "A Concise History of Karnataka".

(2.) It is the case of the plaintiff that he is the author of the book "A Concise History of Kamataka" and the manuscript of the same was given to the defendant for printing; that he had not assigned his copyright to the defendant and therefore, the defendant was and is not entitled to publish the book without assignment of the copy right in writing to him by the plaintiff; that when the book was printed and ready for publishing, the defendant came forward with the plea that the plaintiff had assigned the copy-right though no such assignment had been made by the plaintiff either orally or in writing; that as the defendant tried to publish the book claiming that the plaintiff had assigned the copy-right of the book in question, the plaintiff had no other go but to seek relief as claimed in the suit.

(3.) The appellant-defendant resisted the suit and inter alia contended that there was an oral complete agreement between the plaintiff and the defendant in which the plaintiff agreed to assign the copy-right. Therefore, the defendant was entitled to publish it since the copy right had been assigned to him in lieu of the expenditure incurred for printing the book.