Netflix releases Ramalinga Raju episode of ‘Bad Boy Billionaires: India’ after five-year legal battle

Netflix has finally released the Ramalinga Raju episode of its controversial documentary series ‘Bad Boy Billionaires: India’bringing to an end a legal standoff that delayed the episode’s release for nearly five years.

The episode, titled ‘Riding the Tiger’focuses on the rise and fall of the former chairman of Satyam Computer Servicesand was originally scheduled to premiere in September 2020. Netflix India describes the episode as an account of how Raju, after building one of India’s leading IT firms, manipulated financial records in an attempt to remain competitive.

The release highlights the long-running legal debate surrounding the right to freedom of speech versus the right to privacyparticularly in cases involving convicted individuals and matters of public interest.

The Satyam scam and Ramalinga Raju

Often referred to as “India’s Enron”the Satyam scam came to light in 2009 when Ramalinga Raju admitted to inflating the company’s accounts by over Rs 7,000 crore. Investigators found that the fraud involved fake bank statements, inflated revenues, overstated profits, and nearly 13,000 non-existent employees.

Raju famously described his actions as “riding a tiger, not knowing how to get off without being eaten”a phrase Netflix later used as the title of the documentary episode.

Following his confession, the government intervened to stabilise the company. Satyam was eventually auctioned and acquired by Tech Mahindrawhile Raju and several others were convicted and sentenced to prison.

Netflix vs Ramalinga Raju: The legal battle

Just days before the episode’s scheduled release in September 2020the Hyderabad City Civil Court granted an interim injunction restraining Netflix from airing the episode. Raju argued that the documentary contained “half-truths” that could harm his reputation and violate his right to privacy, and that its release could prejudice his pending legal appeals.

Netflix challenged the order in higher courts but chose not to release the episode while the litigation continued. The streaming platform maintained that the documentary was based entirely on publicly available records and focused on the corporate fraud rather than Raju’s personal life, with the intent of educating viewers about one of India’s largest corporate scandals.

With the episode now available on Netflix, the civil dispute appears to have effectively concluded in favour of the streaming platform. However, it remains unclear whether the original injunction has been formally vacated by the courts.