The Office of Comptroller General of Patents, Designs and Trademarks, between the 28th and 31st March 2016 took ancillary & intense steps against approximately 1.95 lakh applications which were due for processing at various stages in various departments of the office. The highlight of the motion was 31st March 2016 when around 52,000 orders were issued in a single date for abandonment of the application.
The reason given for the said step by the Registrar of Trademark was to avoid congestion of applications to facilitate in smooth functioning of the office, periodical disposal of pending applications and files is practiced across several countries as mentioned in the Madrid Protocol. Although the reasons provided by the Registrar were in accordance with the spirit of Trademark Law followed internationally but the execution was not in accordance with the law and numerous applications were abandoned without following proper procedure provided under the Trademarks Act, 1999.
The Intellectual Property Attorney Association approached the Registrar of Trademarks in this regards and brought to his notice the gross negligence of law. Taking into consideration the plea of the Intellectual Property Attorney Association, the Registrar of Trademark came up with an order wherein the time was provided to all the applicants whose applications were abandoned erroneously to file their reply till 30th April, 2016. The notice dated 04.04.2016 from the Office of The Comptroller General of Patents, Designs and Trademarks read:
"This office has taken steps to treat the applications as abandoned in which no reply to examination report containing office objections to acceptance of the applications for registration has been received within the period of 30 days as per Trade Marks Act, 1999 and rules made there under. It is pertinent to mention that in all such matters the examination reports were already posted on the official website and were also sent to the applicants or their authorized agents concerned individually"
Not satisfied with the order of the Registrar of Trademarks, the Intellectual Property Attorney Association approached the Hon'ble High Court for an urgent hearing of the matter on 05.04.2016 where the uncanny act of the Trademark registry of abandoning several applications at once without providing ample time and notice was taken into keen discussion.
The Hon'ble High Court of Delhi on 05.04.2016 passed an order on Writ Petitions WP (C) 3043/2016 & 3067/2016 and have stayed the orders of abandonment passed by the Registrar on or after 20/03/2016 till further notice. The order read:
"Keeping in view the startling figures of disposal within a short period of time as well as the serious allegations in the present writ petition, the orders of the abandonment passed by the respondents on or after 20th March, 2016 are stayed. Also, till further orders, the respondents shall not treat any Trade Mark applications as abandoned without proper notice to an effected party as provided under Sections 21, 128 and 132 of the Trade Marks Act, 1999"
After the order passed by the High Court of Delhi, The Office of Comptroller General of Patents, Designs and Trademarks, on 11.04.2016 has issued a public notice accepting the erroneous method and course of actions which followed and has now requested all the applicants and the authorized agents affected by the same to submit relevant supporting documents by 30.04.2016 to further formulate and carry out necessary steps in the process. The order for abandonment of trademark applications after 20/03/2016 has now been kept in abeyance as per the order of the Hon'ble Delhi High Court.
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