A Geographical Indication tag has been sought for Gucchi, also known as Morel, one of the world’s most expensive mushrooms growing in Kashmir’s Doda district, valued at over INR 20,000 for every kilogram. The GI Tag will prevent unauthorized use and will provide legal protection to Doda Gucchi Mushroom. This will in turn boost it’s export. It will also promote economic prosperity to locals who practice collection of Gucchi from the forest for generations together.
February 23, 2021
IPR Newsletter- December & January
After saffron, J&K seeks GI tag for gucchi mushroom
Dabur moves the Court Against Marico Ltd. claiming disparagement and denigration
The Plaintiffs’ claim was that the Defendant’s i.e. Marico Limited has launched a product called ‘Saffola AROGYAM chyawan amrut’ in the advertisement of which, it seeks to denigrate and disparage the chyawanprash product category as a whole. It was argued by the Plaintiff that considering the fact that the Plaintiff is the market leader, the denigration of any product category would constitute generic disparagement. The Plaintiff also claimed that the Defendant being a new entrant in the market for this product category, is intending to ride on the reputation of the Plaintiff’s product and to gain market share by portraying itself to be a better product, while denigrating the Plaintiff’s product. The defendants took the defense of commercial free speech under Article 19(1)(A). However, they agreed to modify the impugned print advertisement.
K S & Co Comment:
While advertisements are the best tools to communicate with your potential customers, it is also important to understand what constitutes a fair advertisement. The thin line between competition and disparagement should at all times be firmly intact.
The Bombay High Court holds the mark “SERON” to be deceptively similar to the registered trademark of “SERO”
The Suit was an action in trade mark and copyright infringement combined with a cause of action in passing off. The Plaintiff manufactures garments and fashion apparels, including readymade men’s wear. The contest in this matter was about the two rival marks, SERO, registered to the Plaintiff and the mark adopted by the Defendant, ‘SERON’. The Plaintiff claimed to have not only trade mark registration but copyright in the artwork itself. The Court held that the Defendant’s mark is confusingly and deceptively similar to that of the Plaintiff’s and that prima facie, it appears that the Defendant is trading on the Plaintiff’s goodwill and reputation.
K S & Co Comment:
This makes it abundantly clear that when choosing a mark for your business in which you plan on investing money, it is pertinent that one is vigilant while choosing their marks. Circumstances like such can be avoided. This case is also important from the point of view of a copyright claim in a trademark. One should also view their trademarks from a potency of a copyright if there exists an original artistic work.
Delhi High Court orders removal of libellous and disparaging article against AMUL
The defendant had uploaded a libellous and disparaging article titled as “The White Lie of Amul And Black Truth Of Animal Milk” on his website and his Facebook page, wherein he had specifically targeted the plaintiffs’ milk and milk products under the well-known brand and trademark “AMUL”.
The Plaintiff claimed that the said website was an attempt to create a bias, fear psychosis and prejudice in the minds of the public at large against milk and dairy products. The Court directed the Defendants to remove the said article and also restrained the defendants from uploading articles identical or similar to the said articles on either the website or facebook account.
K S & Co Comment:
It is important to understand that while mentioning anything about another brand / mark, one should always analyse the statement from the point of view of disparagement. Amul, which is known to produce graffiti in a satirical manner, always maintains the thin line between a satire and an insult.
WhiteHatJr. Trademark infringement
In this case, Pradeeep Poonia, a software-engineer based in Bangalore posted the internal communications and chats that was allegedly retrieved via hacking between the employees of Byju’s owned White Hat Jr. Poonia alleged that White Hat Jr. is a ‘Ponzi’ scheme and published defamatory information on his Youtube page ‘WhiteHat Sr’ and his twitter profile.
The plaintiffs being the registered owner of the trademarks ‘Whitehat Jr’ claimed that the defendant by using the marks ‘WhiteHat Sr’ and ‘WhiteHatPoonia’ in his tweets and by running a YouTube Channel with the name ‘WhiteHat Sr’, were infringing the plaintiff’s trade mark rights.
The defendant argued that they are not carrying on any commercial activity by using the trademark ‘Whitehat Sr’ or the similar trademark and therefore, would not amount to trademark infringement. They further contended that the allegations in the plaint do not reach the threshold of defamation.
The Delhi High Court held that defendant’s acts amount to defamation and further directed him to remove specific URLs using “WhiteHat Sr”, his specific tweets commenting about the teachers and their qualification at WhiteHat Jr and restrained him from using “WhiteHat Sr” on Youtube.
K S & Co Comment:
It is interesting to note through this judgement that even though the defendant pleaded that their act is not intended for commercial exploitation of the mark, the court did not pay heed to this argument. Hence, it is important to understand that even though you may not be using the mark in a commercial manner, it is still possible to infringe the mark by using it in an unauthorized way.
Britannia v. Sunfeast
Britannia Industries has filed a case against ITC Ltd for alleged infringement of its product packaging trademark. Britannia has alleged that ITC’s packaging for its newly launched biscuits are “deceptively similar” to Britannia’s Nutri Choice Hi-Fibre and Nutri Choice Digestive biscuits.
Blackberry and Facebook reach settlement in Patent tussle
In 2018, BlackBerry had sued Facebook for allegedly using BlackBerry inventions in its popular messaging applications. Facebook responded with a campaign to challenge the BlackBerry patents, and also filed a suit accusing BlackBerry of infringing patents for voice messaging technology. The two have however, reach
Indian generic drug maker dragged to court by Pfizer
Pharmaceutical company Pfizer has alleged infringements of its patents by generic drug maker Aurobindo as the latter is set out to make generic copies of its arthritis drug, Xeljanz.In its response, Aurobindo alleged that Pfizer’s patents are invalid, unenforceable, and will not be infringed by the commercial manufacture, use or sale of the generic drugs
Spotify patents “plagiarism detector”
Spotify has patented “Plagiarism Risk Detector and Interface” a method which uses artificial intelligence to detect plagiarism in music.
Trademark infringement case
A Delhi District Court in Levi Strauss & Co. vs. Dinesh, granted a permanent injunction to the Plaintiffs restraining the defendants from selling, offering for sale, marketing, advertising, distributing or dealing in/under the impugned trademark ‘LEVI’s’ with/without the ‘Two Horse Logo’ and/or House mark ‘LEVI’s’, along with compensatory damages in sum of Rs. 1 lakh lumpsum on account of unfair economic and commercial advantage which the defendants tried to gain at the expenses of the plaintiff’s reputation as well as costs towards litigation expenses in the sum of Rs. 33,000/- in favour of the plaintiff.
India’s first company to receive patent for advertising fraud detection
A data science and artificial intelligence start up, Com Olho, has received a patent for an advertisement fraud detection technology. It becomes India’s first company to receive patent for advertising fraud detection.
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