The ‘missing files’ at the IPO: Time for a CAG audit?

/ By / Trademark

Earlier this year, we had blogged about the shocking disappearance of around 44,000 missing files from the 5 offices of the trademark registry. The 44,000 missing files had come to light after Justice Murlidhar of the Delhi High Court, hearing a petition by Haldiram Pvt. Ltd., ordered the DIPP to investigate the same. A few months after that internal investigation supervised by Ms. Chandni Raina, Director of the DIPP, the Controller General’s office issued a public notice, informing the general […]

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Parliament returns ‘badly drafted’ commercial division bill

/ By / Uncategorized

As promised, here is my outline of what transpired in yesterday’s Rajya Sabha debate on the Commercial Division of High Courts Bill, 2010. Before heading into the meat of the debate, you may be interested in knowing what the Bill is about. Prashant had blogged about the legislation about two years ago, which you can read here. PRS has its own set of documents on the Bill, which you can access here. (Image from here.) About the Bill: The Bill

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40 Examiners – 15 Registrars – 400,000 pending TM applications – The crippling truth about the Trademark Registry

/ By / Trademark

  Over the last few years, the Trademark Registry has come under fire from several quarters for rampant corruption, as witnessed in the arrest of Ms. Kasturi; startling inefficiency, as witnessed by the thousands of missing files and the poor quality of trademark examinations. While of course, some of these problems can be blamed on the poor moral fibre of some, not all, of the staff at the TM Registry, the larger problem appears to be an absolutely appalling lack

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Copyright Bill interrupted by "conflict of interest"

/ By / Uncategorized

Two Bills – on amendments to the copyright law, and the commercial division of High Courts – were taken up in the Rajya Sabha as expected today. But neither of them saw any closure. The Rajya Sabha’s discussion on the Copyright (Amendment) Bill, 2010 was interrupted as soon as it began. Instead, the brief discussion pivoted around the possible “conflict of interest” of the concerned Minister of Human Resource Development, Mr Kapil Sibal (pictured here). This question was raised because

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Bombay High Court advises Auditoriums against lodging Criminal Complaints against IPRS

/ By / Copyright

The battle between the Indian Performing Rights Society (IPRS) and the Stage Performance Scrutiny Board (SPSB) assumed a new hue recently, when the latter was directed by the Bombay High Court to withdraw a circular that it had issued earlier, seeking to de-recognize IPRS and directing auditoriums to lodge criminal complaints against IPRS, if the latter continues to insist on the requirement of No Objection Certificates for live stage performances based on copyrighted songs. IPRS had also issued a written

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Rajya Sabha scheduled to debate Copyright Amendment Bill and Commercial Division of High Courts Bill tomorrow

/ By / Uncategorized

Tomorrow’s, List of Business for the Rajya Sabha indicates that the Government is seeking to debate and vote on both the Commercial Division of High Courts Bill, 2010 and the Copyright (Amendment) Bill, 2010. Both these Bills were scheduled to be passed in Parliament in the last session which got washed out thanks to the BJP’s protest against the appointment of the Lokayukta in Gujarat by the Governor without consultation with Modi & Co. We had blogged about these Bills

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Customs Dept. pulled up for overstepping its jurisdiction

/ By / Uncategorized

In LG Electonics India Pvt. Ltd v. Bharat Bhogilal Patel & Others, Delhi HC vide its interim order pulled up Customs Dept. for restricting clearance of consignments which, as per latter’s determination, allegedly violated patent. It was held that the Customs Commissioner (Imports), one of the defendants, violated Clause 4 of the Notification No.305/96/2004-FTT videCircular No.41/2007-Customs dated 29.10.2007 (“Notification”) and therefore, exceeded its jurisdiction. The judgment was not unanticipated considering that the Notification unequivocally precludes the Customs Dept. from initiating

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DIPP receives diverse suggestions on reforming the IPO – Poor response from the IP Bar

/ By / Uncategorized

The Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) has recently posted on its website all the feedback received by it in response to its discussion paper on the ‘Review of the Organizational Structure of the Controller General of Patents, Designs, Trademarks and Geographical Indication’. The Department has received feedback from a number of organizations including INTA, INTERPAT, OPPI, IPA, FICCI etc. All the responses can be accessed over here. The most interesting submissions, in my opinion, is from the ‘Officials

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Dealing with frivolous Pre-grant oppositions with detectives

/ By / Patent

A recent case decided by the Controller in a pre-grant opposition highlights the practice of opposing applications from big pharma for the sake of opposition.  In this case, the Applicant (Abbot Labs.) had to resort to investigating the background of one opposing party, and submit voice recordings to the Controller to help him decide whether the opposition filed was frivolous.  The post highlights summarizes the opposition proceedings in the case and provides certain practice pointers at the end.  Hat tip

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Yash Raj Films dragged to Court for alleged copyright infringement in ‘Ladies v. Ricky Bahl’

/ By / Copyright

In yet another case of its kind, the producers of “Naan Avan Illai”, a hit Tamil movie in 2007, filed a lawsuit against Yash Raj Chopra alleging that their recent release “Ladies v. Ricky Bahl” was infringing the copyright belonging to the former. The Tamil Movie in itself is a remake of a 1974 movie by the same name starring superstar – Gemini Ganesan. According to Wikipedia, the 1974 version was a remake of a 1962 Marathi film and play

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