In March 2016 the Trade Marks Registry abandoned applications in bulk — including marks whose owners had filed replies on time. A Delhi High Court writ forced a correction, and a notification set the abandonment orders aside. The episode remains the clearest warning about relying on the Registry’s records alone.
What had happened
Readers following this blog will recall our post of 1 April 2016 reporting the rampant abandonment of marks by the Indian Trade Marks Registry, and the events that followed on 4 April 2016, when the Trade Marks Office issued a public notice attempting to bring order to the chaos. What follows is the next instalment of that saga.
The relief
A notification dated 11 April 2016, passed in compliance with an order of the Delhi High Court in the ongoing writ petition on the subject, provided the opening that aggrieved applicants needed.
The notification confirmed that abandonment orders passed by the Registrar of Trade Marks after 20 March 2016 were set aside. In consequence:
- aggrieved applicants or their agents could file a reply to the examination report through the comprehensive e-filing system, or by email to the addresses specified in the notice; and
- where a reply had already been filed and the Office had mistakenly abandoned the mark anyway, the relevant information along with the examination report was to be emailed to the officer named in the notice.
The notice closed by stating that further action would be taken in accordance with the directions and orders of the Court, based on the pending writ petition.
The gaps in it
The notification was a genuine relief for proprietors and agents whose applications had been unfairly abandoned, and the Office was visibly attempting damage control. But it left real questions open.
It specified no deadline for filing responses. The earlier notification of 4 April 2016 had required applicants of wrongly abandoned marks to provide information before 30 April 2016. Which deadline governed the later notification was simply unclear.
It did not specify what documents were needed to support a claim that the examination report had never been received. That made compliance harder to plan — though the absence of any prescribed proof suggested the Office intended to go easy on applicants whose marks had been unfairly abandoned.
The practical advice at the time was accordingly blunt: if your application had been wrongfully abandoned after 20 March 2016, comply with the latest process immediately rather than waiting for clarity that might not arrive.
What the episode established
The mass abandonment was ultimately corrected, but it left a lasting lesson about service of examination reports. The Registry’s practice of treating an application as abandoned for want of a reply depends entirely on the report having actually reached the applicant or agent — and in 2016 that assumption failed at scale.
Indian courts have repeatedly intervened on this since, holding that an application or opposition should not be treated as abandoned where the applicant was not properly served or was otherwise denied a hearing. The Trade Marks Rules, 2017 later set the reply period at 30 days from receipt of the examination report, which sharpened the deadline without removing the underlying dependence on effective service.
The durable takeaway for practitioners: do not rely solely on receiving communications from the Registry. Monitor application status directly and at regular intervals, because the consequence of a report that never arrives falls on the applicant, and undoing it requires exactly the kind of intervention this episode needed.
The takeaways
- Abandonment orders after 20 March 2016 were set aside by the notification of 11 April 2016.
- A Delhi High Court writ drove the correction — the Office acted in compliance with its order.
- Replies could be refiled through e-filing or the specified email addresses.
- Monitor status independently — service failures fall on the applicant to remedy.
Frequently asked questions
What happened to trademark applications abandoned in March 2016? Abandonment orders passed after 20 March 2016 were set aside following a Delhi High Court order, allowing applicants to file replies to the examination report.
How could applicants respond after the abandonment was set aside? Through the comprehensive e-filing system, or by emailing the Registry addresses specified in the notification — with the examination report attached where a reply had already been filed.
How long is the deadline to reply to an examination report now? Thirty days from receipt of the report, under the Trade Marks Rules, 2017.
What if I never received the examination report? Courts have held that an application should not be treated as abandoned where the applicant was not properly served — but the practical protection is monitoring status directly rather than relying on Registry communications.