Lollywood film Maan Jao Na, which released the previous weekend, has received a stay order from court to remove some of the songs from the film over claims that they did not have the legal copyrights to the songs.
EMI Pakistan which claims to have all rights to the songs in a press release stated, “We, at EMI Pakistan, want to clarify that Muhammad Khalid Ali of Crew Films Motion Pictures and producer of film Maan Jao Na has used three of our songs in his movie without our permission. These songs intellectual property copyrights are controlled and owned by EMI Pakistan and the said matter is already being heard in our legal courts.
Please note that EMI Pakistan in response to Khalid Ali’s defamation case and stay order on rights in the civil court has submitted 7 / 11 applications that clearly states that this case does not come under civil court jurisdiction and instead this case be referred to the Intellectual Property Tribunal. We have further filed a copyright violation case against Crew Films and managed to get a stay order on the songs used illegally.
We at EMI Pakistan strongly condemn music piracy and illegal distribution of music and demand the producers of the film to use legal processes to obtain official permission for the use of our music.”
“Response to accusation of defamation” #MaanJaoNaa #MaanJaoNa pic.twitter.com/paqo9aXDFb
— EMI Pakistan (@EMIPakistan) February 3, 2018
In a recent interview, executive producer and writer of the film Asma Nabeel also shed light on the matter.
“We wanted to revive old Pakistani songs in our film so we used the songs ‘Bijli Bhari Hai Meray Ang Ang Mein’ and ‘Sweety,’ and according to copyright laws we paid for the rights for the songs to the authors and composers of the songs. However what happened was very unfortunate. EMI sent us a claim and we also sent them legal claims. What EMI did was they took a stay from the copyright judge,” she said.
According to Asma, the case is baseless as, “We have taken the rights, we have paid the people,” the producer clarified. The writer has called for support from her peers, as well as a clarification on the matter, asking to reveal who has the legal rights to the songs so they can be paid and the songs can be used in their film.
