Adarsh Ramanujan

Adarsh is an independent counsel with offices in Delhi and Chennai. Before starting his own practice he spent considerable time with Lakshmikumaran & Sridharan at their New Delhi and Geneva offices. He obtained his B.Sc. LL.B. (Hons.) degree (Gold Medalist) from National Law University, Jodhpur and LL.M. degree from University of California, Berkeley. He is a qualified Patent Agent in India. A major portion of his time is spent practicing in the areas of IP & Technology Laws as well as in International Trade Law. He has however branched out into doing commercial litigation and arbitration work. His expertise also extends to regulatory laws such as environmental laws, biodiversity laws and cyber laws. Adarsh has taught patent law in NLU, Delhi, NLU, Jodhpur and at the CEIPI Institute (University of Strasbourg). He has authored or co-authored close to 30 publications on diverse topics, including on IP, WTO, constitutional law and international tax.

Copyright of Music Composers, Lyricists and Performers: Another Missed Opportunity by Mad HC in the Illayaraja Cases – Part II

by Adarsh Ramanujan March 12, 2020

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In Part I of this two-part post, I had analysed the latest judgments of the Madras High Court in Ilaiyaraja (II) and Ilaiyaraja (I), in that order. I had concluded that the Madras High Court in Ilaiyaraja (II) got it right whereas it got it wrong in Ilaiyaraja (I) even though the conclusions are same in both the judgments. This is not a contradiction because the law applicable to the facts in both cases is totally different. In Ilaiyaraja (II),…

Copyright of Music Composers, Lyricists and Performers: Another Missed Opportunity by Mad HC in the Illayaraja Cases – Part I

by Adarsh Ramanujan March 11, 2020

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On February 13th, the Madras High Court passed a judgement in the case of M/s. Indian Record Manufacturing Company Limited v. AGI Music Sdn Bhd and Ors., wherein the music composer, Ilaiyaraja, was Defendant no. 2 (“Ilaiyaraja (II)”). The suit was decreed with costs and the defendants, including Ilaiyaraja, and agents etc. were permanently restrained from infringing the Plaintiff’s copyright over certain specifically identified musical works/sound recordings. This is the second judgment concerning Ilaiyaraja, the first being the judgment in…

Injunctions against Playing Copyright Protected Music/Songs During Celebrations/Parties

by Adarsh Ramanujan March 5, 2020

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The recent orders of the Madras High Court in Phonographic Performance Ltd. v. the Accord Metropolitan and Ors. and Indian Performing Right Society Ltd v. K Murali and Ors., as well as those of the Bombay High Court in six connected matters (Phonographic Performance Ltd v. Hotel Hilton & Ors and 5 others similar matters) were widely reported in media. All the Plaintiff associations obtained interim injunctions against hotels/pubs/event organizers from playing any of the copyrighted works they claim to…

Drug Regulation Patent

Trastuzumab Biosimilar Litigation Saga: A New Order from the Delhi High Court

by Adarsh Ramanujan March 4, 2020

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Last week, the Delhi High Court issued yet another order in the Trastuzumab litigation saga. This time, it is common order in two suits bearing CS (COMM) 1119/2016 (Roche v. Cadila, DCGI and DoB) and CS (COMM) 540/2016 (Roche v. DCGI, DoB and Hetero Drugs Ltd.). This litigation saga has previously been covered here, here, here, here and here. Suffice to say that broadly, the prayers in these suits are similar to the ones in the other suits against Biocon/Mylan and…

News Aggregators’ New Concerns in the EU; Does It Matter in India?

by Adarsh Ramanujan February 29, 2020

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Last year, the Directive on Copyright and Related Rights in the Digital Single Market was adopted in the EU (text available here). The IPKat blog carries a series of posts on it starting here, for those who are uninitiated on the subject. I only intend to discuss a limited point from this new Directive – its impact on “information society service providers” publishing “press publications” online. This impact arises from an entirely new class of right being granted for press…

Patent

Trastuzumab Litigation: A Development from the Supreme Court Concerning Reliance (Setback or Inconsequential?)

by Adarsh Ramanujan December 26, 2019

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On 17th December, a three-judge bench of Supreme Court of India in Genentech Inc. & Ors. v. Drug Controller General of India & Ors., set-aside the interim order of the Division Bench of the Delhi High Court dated 18.09.2019 and restored the earlier order of the single judge dated 25.04.2016. This relates to the biosimilar dispute concerning the drug ‘Trastuzumab’, between Genentech and Roche on the one hand, and Reliance, Mylan and Biocon on the other. The litigation saga has…

Patent Plant Variety Protection

Patents and Plant Variety: Development from Brazil

by Adarsh Ramanujan December 13, 2019

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In this post, I intend to provide my views on the recent judgment of the Superior Court of Brazil (the highest Court in Brazil) dated October 9, 2019 on the overlap (or non-existence thereof) between patent law and plant variety law. Disclaimer 1. I represent Monsanto in India in ongoing litigations on related and unrelated issues. Accordingly, I will not express any views on the position in India; 2. This post is based on a rough/uncertified translation of the judgment,…

Biological Diversity

The New (Draft) Access and Benefit Sharing (ABS) Guidelines – Part II

by Adarsh Ramanujan December 9, 2019

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Continuing further on my comments on the new Draft ABS Guidelines, 2019. Definition of Conventional Breeding Under draft Regulation 12(d), accessing biological resources for “conventional breeding or traditional practices in use in any agriculture, horticulture, poultry, dairy farming, animal husbandry or bee keeping”, is exempt from approval. This exemption can perhaps be traced to the exclusion of the said activities in Section 2(f) of the BDA. However, the regulations now add a qualifier that such activities are exempt only if…

Biological Diversity

The New (Draft) Access and Benefit Sharing (ABS) Guidelines – Part I

by Adarsh Ramanujan December 7, 2019

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In this post, I intend to share my views on the draft “Guidelines on Access to Biological Resources and Associated Knowledge and Equitable Sharing of Benefits Regulations, 2019” (draft ABS Regulations, 2019). As many may be aware, the previous version of the same guidelines was issued in 2014, viz., ABS Regulations, 2014. The draft ABS Regulations, 2019, is intended to replace the earlier version and was put up for comments earlier this year. The topic is a little dated, but…

Plant Variety Protection

Plant Varieties Act: Misunderstood and Misapplied (Part III)

by Adarsh Ramanujan November 5, 2019

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In Part-I and Part-II, I had previously shared a summary of the Public Notice 01/2019 as well as my views on whether (and the extent to which) the said notice is ultra vires. In this Part-III, I intend to take the discussion forward with only one other point Why Only Single Cross Hybrids? Readers may recollect that in the previous posts, I referred to a pictogram to illustrate and differentiate a parent from a hybrid. Those images reflected a single…

Adyasha Samal { Thank you for bringing out that point, sir. Indeed, implementing a mandatory registration system would unfairly deprive Indian authors of the rights that foreign authors would continue to... }
Jagdish Sagar { Under Article 5(2) of the Berne Convention, copyright protection in works originating in other member countries of the Berne Union cannot be subject to any formalities. If India... }
Praharsh Gour { Hey Megha, Thank you for your comments and pointers. The scenario suggested by you are exactly the same thing we have raised concern about. Seemingly the whole business... }
Megha Banerjee { The only reason that government (ICMR) does not allow other pvt. Drug manufacturing companies to manufacture may be restrictions on ICMR and other other govt. Agencies to create... }
Akshat Agrawal { Hi Adarsh. Thank you. Continuing the conversation. Okay so I think step 1 is important. Copyright exists- but on what does copyright exist? The court has many times... }