BENGALURU: The creator of `Humans of New York` has slammed an Indian version of the blog for suing a rival, accusing it of unreasonably monetising the stories of its subjects.

Brandon Stanton launched `Humans of New York` in 2010, sharing interviews with city residents alongside their photos.

It was a runaway success and three years later, Karishma Mehta started `Humans of Bombay` in her home city of Mumbai, which now has 2.7 million followers on Instagram.

This month, Mehta filed a copyright infringement suit against the `People of India` Instagram account, claiming it had `replicated a large number of images and videos` from her page. The case has sparked a social media storm with many chiding Mehta, including Stanton.

`I`ve stayed quiet on the appropriation of my work because I think @HumansOfBombay shares important stories, even if they`ve monetized far past anything I`d feel comfortable doing on HONY,` Stanton wrote Saturday on X, formerly Twitter.

`But you can`t be suing people for what I`ve forgiven you for.`-AFP