Sound Board

Our thoughts and views on the practice of Intellectual Property in India and around the world.

The first draft of the National IPR Policy dated December 19, 2014 was made available to the public amidst all the curiosity regarding the content of this policy and also the controversy concerning the basis of selection of the members of the Think Tank. We had earlier written about how the Think Tank came into being and the tasks that were entrusted to the panel. The DIPP Public Notice of November 13, 2014 had called upon interested persons to submit their comments on the National IPR…

Micromax is the protagonist and OnePlus is the antagonist. And with due apology to Cyanogen: it is the villain says the Delhi High Court in its last judgment before Winter Vacation.

Almost every morning most of the dailies these days carry at-least one article on intellectual property, whether it is about scriptwriters fighting producers on copyright for their stories or celebrities registering their names as trademarks, or the major issue of patents and drugs. As an IP lawyer, it’s great to see that there is some mention of my line of work, despite the fact that most journalists interchange the use and concepts of trademarks, copyright, patents and designs. Nonetheless it…

The law of intellectual property rights is all pervasive – regardless of the industry, product, service or line of work, there is always something in a business that can be protected under some stream of intellectual property. While protection under IP comes when the person with the knowledge discloses it to the government, through patents, copyright and designs, what happens if you don’t want to let other people know? What happens if the knowledge that you hold is something that can be…

A long journey from the hills of Darjeeling via Benaras, Lucknow, Madhya Pradesh, Tirupati and finally to Kanchipuram would be stressful indeed. But the goodies from all these places are what make us show off that we actually went there. Imagine having a hot cup of Darjeeling tea, or wearing Benarasi sari, or eating Tirupati laddu, or having a beautiful Tanjore painting on your wall. All these sure do sound nice. What if I told you that I grew the Darjeeling tea plant in my backyard, or painted…

So you’ve filed and registered your trademark, and have been using it consistently. Life goes on as merrily as possible until you realize that there are counterfeit products with your trademark in the market. The first thing you would have to do is conduct an investigation into where the products are coming from. The counterfeit products could be manufactured within India or it could be manufactured outside the country and shipped in.

I write this post with Indian audience in mind. When reading about or discussing IP laws or rights, we tend to think only of patents, copyrights, trademarks and maybe designs. There are however other intellectual property (IP) laws in India.

TODAY, I was absolutely resolute to write an article on the issue of TODAY. Well, of course, I do mean ‘India Today’ and its failed interim injunction against TV channel ‘Nation Today.’

I believe most lawyers feel parental about their clients’ rights. It is difficult not to when we put in so much effort into identifying, defining and protecting those rights. In doing so, more often than not, we come across some really nasty notices and briefs from lawyers we don’t even know and we take them personally.

For those of you who are wondering if they you have hit the wrong blog, please sit back. This is indeed about Intellectual Property and what I have referred to (in my title) is about the trademark ‘BRAHMOS’. As most of you would be aware, the term ‘BRAHMOS’ is quite popular in relation to supersonic missiles and now the same seems to have rendered a severe blow to two educational institutions, FIIT JEE Ltd and USA Univ Quest.