I want the culture to change, says Sudhanshu Saria on His Storyy poster plagiarism row

ALTBalaji and ZEE5 were called out on Friday by a Twitter user, Jahan Bakshi, who said that the poster of their upcoming series His Storyy was plagiarized from that of Sudhanshu Saria’s critically acclaimed film Loev.

Bakshi was one of the minds behind the poster of Loev which, like His Storyy, revolves around a same-sex love story.

A few hours later, Saria himself took to social media to express his disappointment with the platforms. Stating that it was embarrassing for the artistes associated with the film to post artwork that was "ripped off and stolen” on their social media handles, he said that the two reputed studios had enough resources to design their own artwork and that it was "shameful that they think they can get away with this".

The poster of Loev was designed by Pigeon & Co and was illustrated by Rohan Pore over 13 months. Saria said that since ALTBalaji and ZEE5 seemed to have liked the poster, they should have sought out Pore as artists need to lift each other up.

Despite a barrage of tweets by Bakshi, the contentious poster can still be seen on ALTBalaji's handle. However, Saria said that even if the poster were removed, it shouldn't have been shared online in the first place. “It’s about us as an industry and the culture needs to change,” he said, expressing helplessness, as a producer, about not being able to safeguard his team's work.