Bhushan Kumar had to settle the Animal dispute with Murad Khetani out of court. Although the amount of money paid to Khetani is being kept under wraps, it is believed that the sum is huge. Following the out-of-court settlement, made possible by the good offices of a top producer, Animal will release on Netflix on 26th January.
Murad Khetani, who had co-produced the Ranbir Kapoor starrer with Bhushan Kumar, had filed a case in the Delhi high court, alleging that no accounts of the film were submitted to him and no profits were shared with him in spite of he being a 35% partner in profits and IP of the theatrical blockbuster. Khetani sought a stay on the OTT release of the film. Bhushan Kumar countered Murad Khetani’s claim by telling the court that the latter had relinquished all the rights in the film for which he had been paid Rs. 2.60 crore.
Advocate Sandeep Sethi, on behalf of Murad Khetani, told the court that a comparison between the agreement copies held by Bhushan Kumar and Murad Khetani revealed that the document had been interpolated as the point of relinquishment was in the copy made available by Bhushan Kumar only. The court took a strict view of this. Reportedly, Bhushan Kumar then made the first move to settle the matter out of court.
Actually, the story dates back to the time when Sandeep Reddy Vanga made Kabir Singh for Murad Khetani and his partners. Khetani had signed Vanga for two films. After the stupendous success of Kabir Singh, Murad Khetani asked Vanga to direct another film for him. There had been differences between Khetani and Vanga during the time of release of Kabir Singh and so, Khetani brought T-Series as a partner in Animal. In Animal, Vanga also came in as a partner in production, taking a 30% share. The balance 70% was equally divided between Bhushan Kumar’s T-Series and Murad Khetani’s Cine1 Studios. Khetani’s advocate claimed that his client was not given due credit in the credit titles, he was not given an account of the expenses incurred in the film’s making, and he was also not given a copy of the agreement taking Sandeep Reddy Vanga’s Bhadrakali Pictures as a 30% partner. He also claimed that the deals for the digital and satellite release of Animal with Netflix and Sony were signed without his client’s knowledge. Khetani moved the court to claim his share of profits and IP. The first hearing was held on January 15.
The consent terms were filed in court but the settlement amount has been kept a secret so that it does not come on record. This is permitted as it is an out-of-court settlement.