Author name: Shamnad Basheer

Prof. (Dr.) Shamnad Basheer founded SpicyIP in 2005. He's also the Founder of IDIA, a project to train underprivileged students for admissions to the leading law schools. He served for two years as an expert on the IP global advisory council (GAC) of the World Economic Forum (WEF). In 2015, he received the Infosys Prize in Humanities in 2015 for his work on legal education and on democratising the discourse around intellectual property law and policy. The jury was headed by Nobel laureate, Prof. Amartya Sen. Professional History: After graduating from the NLS, Bangalore Prof. Basheer joined Anand and Anand, one of India’s leading IP firms. He went on to head their telecommunication and technology practice and was rated by the IFLR as a leading technology lawyer. He left for the University of Oxford to pursue post-graduate studies, completing the BCL, MPhil and DPhil as a Wellcome Trust scholar. His first academic appointment was at the George Washington University Law School, where he served as the Frank H Marks Visiting Associate Professor of IP Law. He then relocated to India in 2008 to take up the MHRD Chaired Professorship in IP Law at WB NUJS, a leading Indian law school. Later, he was the Honorary Research Chair of IP Law at Nirma University and also a visiting professor of law at the National Law School (NLS), Bangalore. Prof. Basheer has published widely and his articles have won awards, including those instituted by ATRIP, the Stanford Technology Law Review and CREATe. He was consulted widely by the government, industry, international organisations and civil society on a variety of IP issues. He also served on several government committees.

YOGA PATENT CONTROVERSY: RIP…

/ By / Patent

Thankfully, the government is now well advised (by the Indian embassy in the US), that there is no cause for concern on the Yoga patent front–particularly since there are no patents on Yoga asanas. Readers will recollect that SpicyIP has been reiterating this point and cautioning against the media hype generated in the wake of Suketu Mehta’s NY Times editorial. Interested readers can click on a label titled “Yoga” on the left hand side of the SpicyIP homepage. Sandeep Joshi […]

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SPICYIP TIDBITS

/ By / Uncategorized

1. Asia Pacific Countries wish to copy Section 3(d) The ET reports: “More than 10 countries in the Asia-Pacific region are planning to adopt the much-debated provision which makes it difficult for drug makers to get patent protection for anything less than breakthroughs in pharmaceutical research. The provision describes what sort of pharmaceutical substance is worthy of a patent. The idea is to prevent companies from blocking the entry of cheaper rival products by passing off old medicines in new

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SPICY TIDBITS

/ By / Uncategorized

Starting today, we’re beginning a new section titled “Spicy Tidbits” that will bring you short announcements of leading news in the world of IP and innovation law/policy, in so far as they have some relevance for India. 1. The US moves ahead with its WTO complaint against China, asking for the establishment of a panel. The International Herald Tribune reports: “The Bush administration has asked the World Trade Organization to rule in a complaint against China over the piracy of

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THE RESURGENCE OF PRICE CONTROLS IN INDIA

/ By / Competition Law

In an earlier blog posting, I’d noted: “…pharmaceutical patents are not “bad” per se, as some of the statements in the press would have us believe—rather, as with most other things in life, they are susceptible to “abuse”. In this regard, it is important to strike a distinction between the grant of a patent and the regulation of its “use”. Our fears of a prospective abuse of a patent and excessively high prices should not cause us to deny patent

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THE NOVARTIS PATENT DISPUTE: OF "SPINS" AND EMPTY RHETORIC

/ By / Patent

A couple of days back, in a legal dispute involving the patentability of Novartis’s famed anticancer drug, Gleevec, the Madras High Court ruled that section 3(d) of the Indian Patents Act was constitutional. It also held that it lacked jurisdiction to rule on whether or not section 3(d) contravened TRIPS–and that the appropriate forum to adjudicate this issue was the WTO. I’d hinted at the excessive spin on this judgment by interested stakeholders in an earlier blog posting. Let me

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NOVARTIS CASE AT IPAB STAYED….

/ By / Uncategorized

In a rather sensible move, the Chennai High Court has temporarily stayed the IPAB proceeding, pursuant to a complaint by Novartis that Chandrasekharan may be a biased party and ought not to sit in judgment over the appeal. SPICYIP has been reiterating time and again that Chandrasekharan ought to be replaced–else an otherwise strong case for the government could get dragged on owing to this infirmity. The ET Reports: “Hearings in Novartis’ appeal against the rejection of patent for its

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"Suicide" Inducing Drug in India: Need For More Stringent Drug Regulation

/ By / Drug Regulation, Patent

Bloomberg reports on a very troubling case of a “suicide inducing” diet control drug, that though not likely to be approved in the US, has been approved in India. It notes, in pertinent part: ” Sanofi-Aventis SA’s Acomplia weight- loss pill, linked to suicide, is becoming popular in generic form in India. That may end the product’s chances of ever reaching the U.S., where it has been delayed by regulators. Cipla Ltd. and Ranbaxy Laboratories Ltd. are among six drugmakers

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NOVARTIS LOSES AT THE HIGH COURT: FOCUS NOW SHIFTS TO IPAB

/ By / Patent

Many of you may have already heard the breaking news today……..the Madras High Court ruled against Novartis, holding that section 3(d) is not unconstitutional. It also ruled that it is not competent to adjudicate upon whether or not section 3(d) is TRIPS compliant. Not a very surprising result for SPICYIP, which had already predicted this outcome in an earlier post, noting as follows: “Which way is the court/IPAB likely to go? Difficult to tell at this stage, but to the

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NOVARTIS MOVES HIGH COURT TO REMOVE CHANDRASEKHARAN

/ By / Patent

As anticipated by an earlier SPICY IP post, the Economic Times now reports that Novartis filed a writ petition before the High Court challenging the decision of the IPAB to keep Chandrasekharan on the panel. Not a particularly huge fan of “I told you so…”, but SPICY IP had cautioned against the very transfer of the case itself to the IPAB in one of the earliest posts, stating that this was a bad move. We had first noted in April

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BUILDING AN INNOVATION ECO SYSTEM IN INDIA

/ By / Innovation, Patent

An excellent article in the Deccan Herald on the need for building an innovation ecosystem in India by NASSCOM’s VP, Rajdeep Sahrawat. As Sahrawat rightly notes, the ability to take “risks” is a very important factor in incentivising innovation. And this may perhaps explain why despite our software prowess, we are still not known for any significant “innovative” IT products. Rather, the easy money that comes with our “services” model in the IT sector (where we build products for others

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