Re(tro)specting Dilution?

/ By / Trademark

India introduced a statutory right to prevent “dilution” of well known marks for the first time in 2003 (through the Trademarks Act 1999, which came into force in September 2003). We’d blogged about this provision in the past in several of our blog posts. A friend of mine queried me on the “retrospectivity” of the provision. He pointed to Section 159 of the Act to argue that the provision cannot apply to third parties who’d used the “mark” prior to […]

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SpicyIP Tidbit: Customs Department allows parallel import of Dell computers; orders Dell to pay damages

/ By / Trademark

In an interesting report carried in the Economic Times, it has been reported that the Commissioner of Customs has not only allowed the parallel imports of Dell computers into the country but also ordered Dell to pay demurrage & warehousing charges to the importers whose goods had been seized for over two months due to a complaint made by Dell.  While the report does not specifically explain the law under which the consignments were withheld, I’m guessing that Dell had

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Trying to make sense of TKDL’s access policy – Why is the Indian Patent Office being ignored?

/ By / Uncategorized

The Traditional Knowledge Digital Library(TKDL) which we have often blogged about on this blog for reasons that are good, bad and ugly, is an ambitious project, by CSIR & the Ministry of Health, Govt. of India to digitize and compile various traditional knowledge resources in India, into a digital searchable database. Although the TKDL has been rightly accused of over-exaggerating claims of its effectiveness, in certain cases, there is no denying that it has been very useful in opposing at

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47% vacancy at the Copyright Office

/ By / Copyright

One of the constant complaints on this blog has been the lack of resources and staffing at the Copyright Board. The situation was so bad that the Delhi High Court took suo-moto cognizance of the state of affairs at the Copyright Board. Maintaining and running the Copyright Board is one of the many duties of the Copyright Office. Recently, I filed a RTI application with the Ministry of HRD requesting them to release information on the sanctioned strength of the

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Indian Intermediary Liability Law Requires a Thorough Makeover

/ By / Copyright

Two recent developments, on two different sides of the world, have reopened my eyes to the flawed intermediary liability legal regime that currently exists in India. The first was the recent ruling of the second circuit appellate court in the United States in the much publicised Youtube-Viacom copyright infringement suit. The second one is closer home – the recent calls for the annulment of the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines) 2011 from a Rajya Sabha MP and a writ petition filed

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Why is it so difficult for CSIR to be ‘transparent’?

/ By / Uncategorized

Over the last few years, I’ve personally filed several Right to Information (RTI) applications with several government offices and save for some initial hiccups at the Copyright Office, the responses that I received from most Central Government Offices have been quite satisfactory or in the case of the DIPP, exemplary. The one sore exception to this rule is the Council for Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR). Image from here. For some reason, CSIR fancies itself as a private corporation which

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SpicyIP Announcements: CUSAT Inter University Centre for IPR Studies Offers Short-term Fellowships to M.Phil/Ph.D Students

/ By / Event

The Inter University Centre for IPR Studies (IUCIPRS) offers short term fellowships of Rs.5000/- (Rupees Five Thousand only) per month for a maximum period of three months for M.Phil/Ph.D scholars in IPR related areas who have already registered in any recognized Universities in India. The objective of this short term fellowship is to facilitate M.Phil/Ph.D students registered for M.Phil/Ph.D in IPR related areas in any discipline in any recognized University in India other than CUSAT to utilize the resources in

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Novartis AG’s Indian Patent Specification: On file with SpicyIP

/ By / Uncategorized

After a 5 month long wait, the Patent Office at Chennai dispatched the information to an RTI application filed by me on November 01, 2011 asking for a photocopy of the entire case file of Novartis AG’s patent application on the anti-cancer drug, Glivec. The docket runs over 2500 pages. The complete patent specification filed on July 17, 1998 can be accessed from here.  Other files include First Examiner’s comments on patent specification, documents relating to grant of Exclusive Marketing Rights

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More bad news for the King of Good times as Force India Lose Aerolab IP Case

/ By / Copyright

When it rains it pours. As if Kingfisher’s woes weren’t enough, Mallya’s Force India lost their IP design battle against Aerolab last week, which is set to cost them about 850,000 euros plus legal fees which could amount to millions. The Chancery Division of the High Court of Justice last week finally gave its verdict in this long running dispute. The judgement which runs to over 300 pages and involved 14 days of hearing is finally out. The full decision

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Report of IP Roundtable Symposium organized by the MHRD IP Chair in NLU Jodhpur

/ By / Uncategorized

The readers of Spicy IP will already be aware of the two-day roundtable symposium on the ‘Emerging Legal and Policy Landscape of Intellectual Property Protection for Pharmaceuticals in India’ that was organized by the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) Chair on IPR at National Law University, Jodhpur in collaboration with the University Grants Commission on 17th and 18th March, 2012 (announced here). The symposium had brought together prominent multi-disciplinary experts, legal practitioners, academicians, policy specialists, representatives from the pharmaceutical

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