Tribhuvan Mishra: CA Topper vs ICAI: Netflix releases web series after nod from Delhi HC

Netflix web series Tribhuvan Mishra: CA Topper premiered yesterday, Thursday, July 18, on Netflix, despite a legal suit filed by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI), seeking to restrain the TV show from streaming.

To recall, ICAI filed a suit for a permanent injunction at the Delhi High Court (HC) to restrain the streaming platform from telecasting the web series which, as per them, defames the profession.

In a hearing on Wednesday, July 16, Justice Navin Chawla of the Delhi High Court gave a green light to the Netflix series, stating that it does not defame the CA community as a whole. Rather, it is just a story about one person who is a CA topper and “happens to be a sex worker”.

The Chartered Accountants had expressed that the series is "sensationalised and malicious”, containing vulgar depictions in the name of the profession.

An online petition was also started last week by CA Sripriya Kumar on Saturday, July 13, expressing concern about the portrayal of the profession of Chartered Accountancy (CA) in the upcoming Netflix series.

When the trailer had dropped last week, there was immediate backlash from the CA community, with Dr Rohit Ruwatia Agarwal, a Central Council Member of ICAI informing via a post on X that ICAI will be taking the legal route against the show.