Companies often struggle to control unauthorised copies of their products appearing on the Indian market. The preferred legal remedy is a court injunction to forbid the sale of the copy products. But such permanent court orders can take a long time to obtain. In fact, according to Legal Media Group, a five year wait is not uncommon, due to the size of India's judicial backlog.
While they wait, companies rely on preliminary injunctions from the courts, a much faster remedy. One difficulty in obtaining preliminary injunctions in India, however, is that the courts have had inconsistent answers to the question of how quickly the requests should be filed after an infringement takes place. This has been clarified by the ruling of 22nd January.
According to the legal publisher, the Indian Supreme Court was considering a case of passing off and copyright infringement filed by chemical company Midas Hygiene Industries against Sudhir Bhatia, a company that Midas accused of selling insecticide and pesticide products in copycat packaging.
An interim injunction had been granted at the initial hearing but thrown out on appeal because of a delay in filing the action.
However, the Supreme Court ruled that a delay in filing does not warrant the denial of an injunction.
The Court added that an injunction should be granted if, on the face of it, it appears that the use of the brand or mark is dishonest.