India’s ABS Blind Spot: Conceptualising the Monitoring of Animal Genetic Resource Utilization under the ABS Framework

Unlike plant genetic resources, animal genetic resources have historically moved across borders through centuries of livestock exchange, breeding and interbreeding, making their origins and subsequent utilisation particularly difficult to trace. In this post, Achyuth examines India’s blind spots in monitoring their utilisation under the Access and Benefit-Sharing (ABS) framework and explores how inter-institutional coordination could help address them. Achyuth B. Nandan is a PhD candidate at Rajiv Gandhi School of Intellectual Property Law, IIT Kharagpur, specialising in intellectual property law.

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SpicyIP Weekly Review (October 26-November 1)

Announcing the 2026 Shamnad Basheer Essay Competition, a post on the ongoing Cadila-Hetero biosimilar dispute ahead of the Supreme Court hearing, and posts on the Indian Designs Office’s draft GUI Guidelines and the Trade Marks Registry’s proposed framework for the use of AI in proceedings. This and much more in this week’s SpicyIP Weekly Review. Anything we are missing out on? Drop a comment and let us know. Highlights of the Week Announcing the 2026 Shamnad Basheer Essay Competition on

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SpicyIP Bells & Whistles: IP Events and Opportunities (02.11.2026)

Welcome back to another week of Bells & Whistles. As always, we’ve rounded up a mix of developments, opportunities, and thoughtful reads from across the IP world along with a Bell of the Week that’s well worth revisiting. Bell of the Week: Who Gets Counted as an Inventor? When we think about the history of invention, we often think of the people whose names have become synonymous with a particular discovery or technology. But how much of this history do

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Letting the Plaintiff Examine Regulator’s Approvals: Unpacking the DHC’s Cadila-Hetero Discovery Order Ahead of the SC Hearing

[Thanks to Swaraj Barooah sharing an in-progress draft from a project he is working on examining cancer litigation in India. The questions in there led me to write this post.] Can a court say a company has no right to confidentiality in its regulatory data, and then hand that data to a rival’s expert in a sealed cover? The Delhi High Court decided it can. On 3 November 2026, the Supreme Court is scheduled to take up two Special Leave

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Announcing the 2026 Shamnad Basheer Essay Competition on Intellectual Property Law

Celebrating the 50th birth anniversary of Prof. Basheer, earlier this year, we had promised to return with the 2026 edition of the Shamnad Basheer Essay Competition on Intellectual Property Law. And we are now delighted to announce the launch of this year’s competition! A master with the pen, Prof. Basheer continues to inspire us with his ability to make complex legal ideas accessible to a wider audience. Our long-time readers, and the many others who have engaged with his work,

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Draft Trade Marks Manual 2026: Gaps DPIIT Must Address Before It Goes Final

On August 21, 2026, the Department for Promotion of Industry and Trade (DPIIT) published a Draft Manual on Trade Marks: Practice & Procedure 2026 (Draft Manual) in the Gazette of India, inviting public comments within fifteen days. Running over two hundred pages, the Draft Manual is meant to be the operational rulebook for examiners and registrars and a guide for prospective applicants of a mark. The Draft Manual is an updated version of the 2015 Manual. It has added a

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[Part I] RAM, Routine, and Rights: Looking at the IP Chapter in the EU-India Draft FTA

The Draft India-EU FTA, dubbed the “mother of all deals”, includes a Chapter on Intellectual Property (IP) (Chapter 10), which has sparked concern about outlawing activities that Indian law allows for, such as Digital Archiving or creating temporary copies in RAM while routing web data. While India has not yet published the draft, the EU made it available on 15th September. Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal recently reiterated that the FTA remains on track for finalisation by December 2026, with formal

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Can an Animation Be a Design? Examining India’s Draft GUI and Icon Design Guidelines, 2026

The Indian Designs Office’s draft GUI Guidelines mark an important step following the Calcutta High Court’s decision in NEC Corporation v. Controller of Patents on the registrability of GUIs. Harshita Bhola writes on the Guidelines, noting that while they are a welcome improvement that could bring greater consistency and predictability to examination practices, the proposed requirement to submit separate representations of individual frames risks overlooking the creative contribution underlying an animation. Harshita Bhola is a 7th-semester B.A. LL.B. (Hons.) student

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A Fake Judgment, an AI-Designed Mark and a Missing Declaration: What Do the TMR’s Draft AI Guidelines Actually Regulate?

The draft Guidelines on the Use of Artificial Intelligence in Proceedings before the Trade Marks Registry seek to address the growing concerns around AI-generated fabricated citations and misleading evidence. However, as explained by Kaustub Boidi, the proposed framework leaves important questions unanswered about the Registry’s own verification responsibilities, the treatment of legitimate AI-assisted translations, and whether the prescribed consequences are proportionate to different forms of non-compliance. Kaustub is a final-year law student at SVKM’s NMIMS, Hyderabad. His interests lie in

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Hidden AI Prompts in Petitions: Why Indian Courts Should Take This Up Suo Motu

As courts increasingly turn to AI tools for legal research and document processing, could hidden instructions embedded in pleadings manipulate the outputs they rely on? In this post, Rohit Pradhan examines the threat of prompt injection in judicial proceedings, distinguishes it from AI hallucinations, and proposes safeguards for e-filing systems and legal accountability in India. Rohit Pradhan is an IP litigator based in Delhi, practising before the Delhi High Court. Hidden AI Prompts in Petitions: Why Indian Courts Should Take

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