Shashi Tharoor moves Delhi High Court against AI deepfake videos praising Pakistan
Shashi Tharoor on Friday approached the Delhi High Court against the circulation of AI-generated deepfake videos allegedly showing him praising Pakistan and making politically sensitive remarks he never made.
Justice Mini Pushkarna issued summons to social media platforms X, Meta Platforms and the Centre while hearing the plea. The court also indicated that it may pass an interim order in favour of the Congress MP.
Senior advocate Amit Sibal, appearing for Tharoor, argued that unknown entities were repeatedly publishing fake videos using the leader’s face, voice and personality traits through artificial intelligence technology. He said the content had seriously harmed Tharoor’s reputation and public image.
According to the plea, the fabricated videos falsely portrayed the former Union minister and chairperson of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on External Affairs making statements supportive of Pakistan. Sibal argued that the videos could also damage India’s international standing and be misused by foreign actors.
The court was informed that several URLs carrying the deepfake content had already been taken down following complaints filed under IT Rules and with police authorities. However, the fake videos continued to reappear across social media platforms.
Counsel representing Meta informed the court that the objectionable Instagram content had already been blocked earlier in the day.
In his petition, Tharoor claimed that the malicious campaign began around March 2026 during the Kerala Assembly election campaign period. The plea stated that AI and machine learning tools were used to create hyper-realistic videos by cloning his face, voice, vocabulary and mannerisms.
The lawsuit further stated that the disinformation campaign was deliberately timed to tarnish his patriotic image, manipulate public opinion and interfere with the democratic electoral process during the Kerala elections.
The petition also argued that the unauthorised use of Tharoor’s likeness violated his personality rights, publicity rights and right to privacy.
Several public figures, including Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Abhishek Bachchan, Salman Khan, Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, Sudhir Chaudhary, Raj Shamani and Pawan Kalyan, have previously moved the Delhi High Court seeking protection against misuse of their personality and publicity rights through AI-generated content.
Recently, the high court also granted interim relief to Gautam Gambhir and actors Sonakshi Sinha, Vivek Oberoi and Allu Arjun in similar cases involving personality rights protection.
