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IP Case Digest · Trade Marks Act s.2

Section 2, Trade Marks Act: case law

3 judgments of the Chhattisgarh High Court and the Delhi High Court applying Trade Marks Act s.2, from 2023–2024, each with a headnote by BRB Legal.

3judgments
2courts
2023–2024years

Chhattisgarh Distilleries Limited v. Great Galleon Ventures Limited

Chhattisgarh High Court · Dismissed

Appeal dismissed and the return of the plaint for want of territorial jurisdiction upheld. The plaintiff relied on an FIR lodged by the Excise Department within Chhattisgarh, under which goods bearing the impugned mark were confiscated. The Division Bench held that the plaint nowhere alleged that the FIR was made against any officer of the defendant company, that the defendant resided and carried on business at Indore, and that there was no plea that it had sought an excise licence to sell within Chhattisgarh. A bald statement about a seizure by the police was not enough to show that the defendant sold the goods there or that any part of the cause of action arose there.

Khandelwal Edible Oils Limited v. Landsmill Agro Private Limited

Delhi High Court · Allowed in part

Interim injunction granted against CHAKRA KOHLU but refused against CHAKRIKA and CHAKRESH. CHAKRA KOHLU reproduces the whole of the registered mark CHAKRA and merely adds a word, and the defendant's own rectification petition had averred that the marks were textually, phonetically and visually similar and bound to cause confusion. That admission could not be escaped by calling it a cut and paste error or by switching to the alternative plea that CHAKRA was descriptive. CHAKRIKA and CHAKRESH are single compound words which cannot be vivisected to isolate CHAKR, and registration of CHAKRA gives no monopoly over Hindi words beginning with that syllable. The Court added that mere registration of a mark is not infringement under section 29: absent evidence of use of CHAKRIKA, no interlocutory injunction could issue in respect of it.

M/S Suman International & Anr. v. Mahendra Gulwani & Anr.

Delhi High Court · Set aside

Appeal allowed and the interim injunction set aside. The Commercial Court had held that the word Rose was common and could not be monopolised, yet found SWEET ROSE LOLLIPOP deceptively similar to MADHUR ROSE POP LOLLIPOPS, giving no reason for that conclusion or for its parallel finding on packaging. The Division Bench held that the marks must be seen as a whole: the common elements ROSE and LOLLIPOP are descriptive of the product and cannot be monopolised, the appellant's mark led with its house name UNICON, and section 30(2)(a) protects use indicating the kind or quality of goods. On packaging, the colour schemes and placement differed, and a transparent top panel for displaying the product is common to the trade.

Other provisions of the Trade Marks Act

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