Author blocks Indian drama series

Bradford is one of the world's biggest selling authors

Best-selling author Barbara Taylor Bradford has obtained a court injunction in India to stop the broadcast of a new soap opera on Indian television.

Karishma - The Miracle of Destiny, was billed as India's biggest and reportedly most expensive TV series and stars one of Bollywood's most popular actresses.

Ms Bradford alleges the serial is a plagiarised version of the novel that first took her into the international best-seller lists.

The inaugural broadcast scheduled for Monday has had to be cancelled while legal proceedings get under way.

Ms Bradford and her film producer husband Robert Bradford flew into Calcutta from New York last week for the 45-minute court hearing.

The High Court ordered the show to be put on hold and appointed two officers to investigate all the material relating to the petition.

Lawyers for the series makers, Sahara Media Entertainment company, said they could not comment on the action until they responded in court later this week.

Rags to riches

The legal wrangle has led to the postponement of the much publicised television debut of Bollywood's leading lady, Karishma Kapoor.

She was due to star in the serial, which unusually for an Indian soap opera, features some episodes filmed in foreign locations such as New Zealand.

The story spans three generations, with Karishma Kapoor playing a rags to riches heroine.

She embarks on a life of ambition when she is 20 years old and becomes a successful businesswoman against all odds.

But Ms Bradford says it is all very familiar because she wrote it herself back in 1979 in the novel "A Woman of Substance".

According to Calcutta's Telegraph newspaper, Ms Bradford's lawyers allege the plot and characters were lifted from her novel, and she did not give permission to produce a TV series based on it.