Intellectual Property Law and Brand Protection

The Chambers undertakes intellectual property and brand protection work spanning trademark prosecution, copyright & licensing, and contentious disputes involving infringement, passing off, unauthorised use, and online brand & domain-name issues, arising in civil, commercial, and consumer contexts.

At the prosecution stage, we assist with trademark registration, including responses to examination reports on grounds of distinctiveness & descriptiveness and objections raised on grounds of similarity to existing marks, and represent clients in opposition proceedings before the Trade Marks Registry; both filing oppositions to protect an existing mark and defending an applicant’s mark against third-party opposition, as well as in rectification and cancellation proceedings challenging the validity or continued registration of a mark on grounds of non-use, prior use, or bad faith adoption.

On the contentious side, our infringement practice covers deceptive similarity, both visual & phonetic, the doctrine of likelihood of confusion, and the extended protection available to well-known marks against use on dissimilar goods or services, alongside passing-off actions grounded in common law, where the contest typically centres on proof of goodwill & reputation, misrepresentation, and resulting damage. We also advise on trade dress and get-up disputes, including packaging, colour combination, and overall product presentation, and on comparative advertising and disparagement claims where a competitor’s marketing is alleged to unfairly denigrate a rival’s goods or services.

In copyright matters, our work spans ownership disputes including the distinction between works made in the course of employment and those created under a commissioned or contractual arrangement, licensing disputes over the scope, exclusivity, and territorial or medium-specific limits of a grant, and infringement claims involving reproduction, adaptation, and unauthorised communication to the public, including in digital and streaming contexts. Where IP issues intersect with business relationships, we advise on protection of confidential information and trade secrets in employment arrangements, the enforceability of non-disclosure and non-compete covenants, disputes over ownership of IP created by employees and independent contractors absent a clear assignment clause, and IP indemnity and warranty provisions in commercial & licensing contracts.

Online brand protection forms a significant part of our practice, covering domain-name disputes and cybersquatting including proceedings under the .IN Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (INDRP) and bad-faith registration of confusingly similar domains, and unauthorised use of trademarks as keywords or in metadata for search engine advertising, as well as disputes arising from counterfeit and grey-market listings on e-commerce platforms, including questions of marketplace intermediary liability and the adequacy of platform takedown mechanisms under the Information Technology Act and applicable intermediary guidelines.

On remedies, we act in applications for interim and permanent injunctions, including ex-parte ad-interim relief and John Doe (Ashok Kumar) orders against unidentified infringers, as well as proceedings for rendition of accounts, delivery-up of infringing material, and damages, and we advise on settlement strategy, including coexistence agreements and negotiated licensing as an alternative to prolonged litigation where commercially appropriate.