Author name: Praharsh Gour

Breaking: President Promulgates Tribunal Reforms (Rationalisation and Conditions of Service) Ordinance 2021

/ By / Copyright, Design, Geographical Indication, Patent, Plant Variety Protection, Trademark, Uncategorized

IPAB has been in the eye of the storm since its inception. While there are ardent believers of the institution (See here and here), there are equally strong arguments by the ones against it (few of them advanced by the former Chairperson of the institution itself!) (See here here and here). A few months ago, the Executive seemingly laid the debate to rest by introducing the Tribunal Reforms (Rationalisation and Conditions of Service) Bill 2021, proposing to scrap IPAB. However, …

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The Third to Tango: After Pakistan, Nepal Opposes India’s GI Application for Basmati

/ By / Geographical Indication

In November, 2020, Varsha wrote a detailed piece on the ongoing dispute between India and Pakistan on registration of GI over Basmati in the EU. Seemingly, after months of speculations (here and here) Nepal has finally joined the fight, opposing India’s application. This perhaps makes it the first IP disputes between the three South Asian countries.  While a more detailed post on this opposition will follow soon, I would like to quickly highlight a few interesting facts surrounding this event …

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Justice Manmohan Singh Holds Hearings at IPAB Despite Supreme Court Ruling

/ By / Copyright, Geographical Indication, Patent, Plant Variety Protection, Trademark

Heard it through the grapevine and saw in the causelist that Retd. Justice Manmohan Singh is still holding hearings in the IPAB and passing orders. Just a couple of days ago we reported that the application for Justice Singh’s extension as the IPAB Chairperson was rejected by the Supreme Court. The Court in its judgement (pdf) expressly noted that the tenure of the incumbent Chairperson ended on 21.09.2019 and further rejected the notion that the incumbent must remain as the …

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Breaking: Finance Minister Proposes a Draft Bill in Lok Sabha to Shut Down IPAB

/ By / Others

Just hours ago we broke the story about the Supreme Court judgement (pdf) dismissing the application seeking extension of the incumbent IPAB Chairperson and now we are in knowledge of an immensely interesting Draft Bill (pdf) introduced in the Lok Sabha which proposes to shut IPAB for good! The Bill was introduced the day before yesterday (11.02.2021) by the Union Finance Minister Ms. Nirmala Sitharaman, bearing the title “The Tribunals Reforms (Rationalisation And Conditions Of Service) Bill, 2021”. While seeking …

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Breaking: Supreme Court Dismisses Application Seeking Extension of Justice Manmohan Singh as IPAB Chairperson

/ By / Others, Plant Variety Protection

Hitting the (seemingly) final nail and ending the trail of extension requests, the Supreme Court via its order yesterday (12/02/2021 (pdf) ) dismissed the application seeking another extension to the tenure of the incumbent IPAB Chairperson. The application for extension was filed by the AIPPI (aka the International Association for the Protection of Intellectual Property) and was a part of a writ petition which was disposed of by the court after tagging it to Madras High Court Bar Association decision. …

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Delhi High Court Interprets ‘Export’ as ‘Use’ in India; Grants Interim Injunction to Lundbeck

/ By / Patent

The Delhi High Court passed an order last month in the matter of H Lundbeck A/S v. Hetro Drugs Ltd., whereby it ruled that “export of the products from India would amount to use of the product in India” under Section 107 of the Patents Act. While according this meaning to the term ‘export’, the court however, did not elucidate on the reasoning for its interpretation. The present post will discuss why the present ruling is inconsistent with the nature of …

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Supreme Court Revisits Tribunal Culture (Yet Again): Upholds Validity of 2020 Rules with Conditions

/ By / Copyright, Geographical Indication, Others, Patent, Plant Variety Protection, Trademark

Adding to an existing trail of decisions on administration of the tribunals, the Supreme Court passed a detailed judgement in Madras High Court Bar Association v. Union of India last month, wherein it upheld the constitutional validity of the Tribunal, Appellate Tribunal and other Authorities (Qualifications, Experience and other Conditions of Service of Members) Rules, 2020 (or Tribunal Rules 2020). Among other things, the decision is crucial for its observation on appointment of the Chairpersons, Vice-Chairperson and Technical Members to …

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As 15 Asia Pacific Countries Sign RCEP, India Chooses to Sit Out

/ By / Others, Patent

Last week, ten south-east Asian countries along with Japan, China, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand signed the Agreement on Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) making it the world’s largest trade bloc. Initially projected as the alternative to Trans Pacific Partnership, the negotiations for this free trade agreement (FTA) were underway since 2012 and after 31 rounds (as per Wikipedia), the member states finally sealed the deal four days ago via a video conference. While some reports suggest that the …

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Delhi HC Delivers a Blow to “Delhivery”: Rules the Mark to be Phonetically Generic; Ineligible for Statutory Benefits

/ By / Trademark

In an interesting turn of events, the Delhi HC on 12th October, 2020, vacated an interim injunction effectively permitting the Respondent (Treasure Vase Ventures Pvt. Ltd.) to use the impugned trademark ‘DELIVER-E’.  In doing so the court held that the Applicant’s (Delhivery Pvt. Ltd.) registered trademark ‘DELHIVERY’ is phonetically similar to the English word ‘delivery’ and is a generic mark, not eligible for benefit of statutory rights. The court reiterated that unless a generic mark has achieved distinctiveness, it cannot …

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Wishful Thinking? Analyzing India and South Africa’s Joint Statement to Waive Key Provisions of TRIPS- Part II

/ By / Copyright, COVID-19, Patent, Trade Secret

In the first part of this two-part post, I assessed the joint statement proposed by South Africa and India for waiver of certain key provisions of TRIPS. Following the joint statement, 379 NGOs and members of civil societies wrote to WTO, in support of the waiver. On the day of the meeting, the proposal attracted the support of a large number of developing countries and LDCs, notably Tanzania, Chad, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Venezuela, Honduras, Nepal, Nicaragua, Egypt, Indonesia, Argentina, …

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