Delhi High Court Grants Protection To Indiamart's Trademark, Criticises Opponent For Misusing Its Promoters' Photos To Mislead Consumers

Justice C. Hari Shankar of the Delhi High Court recently granted a permanent injunction in favour of Plaintiff-INDIAMART, which had filed a suit seeking restraining of defendant No.1 from using its trademark (or any deceptively similar mark) as well as logos.

The plaintiff pled that it was the holder of various valid and subsisting trademarks as well as domain names comprising “INDIAMART”. As such, defendant No.1’s adoption of “INDIAMART” was a clear case of infringement and passing off.

It was further claimed that the plaintiff’s marks constituted “original artistic works” within the meaning of Section 2(c) of the Copyright Act, 1957, and thus, defendant No.1 was infringing upon its copyright as well.

Defendant No.1 did not enter appearance and was proceeded ex-parte.

The Court observed that defendant No.1 had clearly been using plaintiff’s registered trademark “INDIAMART” and copied its logo to provide services.

It took serious note of the fact that defendant No.1 had put up pictures of the plaintiff’s promoters on its own website, presumably to mislead consumers into believing that plaintiff and defendant No.1 were associated.

In effect, the Court permanently injuncted defendant No.1 from using the plaintiff’s trademark “INDIAMART” (or any mark deceptively similar thereto). It further restrained defendant No.1 from using the impugned logos to protect plaintiff’s copyright in them.

In addition, certain domain names were directed to be transferred to the plaintiff. Considering that defendant No.1 had adopted a “nefarious scheme to dupe innocent persons”, the Court also granted punitive damages to the tune of Rs.10 lakhs in plaintiff’s favour.

Notably, the plaintiff is in the business of running an electronic B2B portal. As per claims, it is India’s first B2B directory that commenced operations in 1996 and coined the term “INDIAMART”. In 2021-22 alone (till December 2022), the sales revenue of the plaintiff was in the region of Rs. 550 crores.

Ms. Deepika Pokharia, Mr. Nitin Sharma and Mr. Naman Tandon, Advocates appeared for Plaintiff

Ms. Hetu Arora Sethi, ASC appeared for GNCTD with Mr. Arjun Basra, Advocates for IFSO Spl. Cell, Delhi Police

Ms. Shweta Sahu, Advocate appeared for defendant No.3

Case Title: INDIAMART Intermesh Limited v. Mr. Sameer Samim Khan & Ors.

Citation: 2023 LiveLaw (Del) 1004

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