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De-Coding the New Indian IP Law
Posted on: March 21, 2018
Several measures have been taken to ensure continuous and unending improvement of the Indian IP ecosystem in the country. To this effect, Department of Industrial Policy and Planning (DIPP), Ministry of Commerce & Industry, Government of India, has formulated a multipronged strategy to develop an Intellectual Property regime in the country to promote creativity and to develop the culture of respect for innovations and creativity.
Measures taken to create a strong and vibrant IP regime in India are:
Modernization of administration: Creation of a highly transparent, e-enabled, efficient and accessible IP ecosystem in India that provides legal certainty to the industry.
A. Human Resources: An additional 1033 plan posts have been created, including 666 posts for Patents & Designs and 367 posts for Trademarks and GI at various levels.
B. Ease of access: The IP system embarked on its e-journey by introducing the complete electronic processing of Patents and Trademarks applications through specialized modules. To cater to the immense flow of the papers filed, a single central server at IPO Delhi is in place. Since India has a unique intellectual property office wherein there are 4 patent offices and 5 trademark offices, there is need for strong intra-office connectivity. The system is unique in itself since there is automatic generation of application numbers as also automatic allotment of the request for examination which is sequential and thus transparent and user-friendly.
Transparency and dissemination of information: The official website provides vast information relating to patents, trademarks, designs and geographical indications. The real time status of IP applications with entire file wrappers and e-registers is now open to the public, providing a strong tool to the public that can now be an integral part of the IP system. An innovative tool, showing the stock and flow of patents and trademarks applications at every stage of its processing, has ushered in transparency.
Fee Concession for MSME: MSMEs account for 45% of total industrial production and the total contribution of MSMEs to India’s GDP is 38%. To encourage them to innovate and seek protection for their inventions, a 50 % fee reduction has been provided for MSMEs.
Madrid Protocol: The operationalization of the Madrid protocol for international protection of trademarks provides the user the facility of protecting his trademark in 90 countries by filing a single application in one language with one set of fees filed at the Trademarks Registry.
International Search Authority and International Preliminary Examining Authority: India has been recognised by the World Intellectual Property Organization as the 17th International Search Authority and International Preliminary Examining Authority in the world. It began its operations in 2014. India prides itself on providing quality reports at the lowest cost among the international players like USPTO, EPO, JPO etc. At present it has been recognised as ISA/ IPEA for nationals of Republic of Iran.
C. IPR Awareness Programmes: Awareness creation is one of the major planks of the modernization scheme of IP system, as this will educate the stakeholders about the benefits of registration of their rights as also educate the general public, particularly the business community, on perils of infringement of IPRs held by others/ dealing in pirated and counterfeit products. These programmes are also expected to sensitise the enforcement agencies such as state police forces, and the judiciary.
EINFOLGE offer a whole gamut of Patent and IPR services tailored according to the specific needs of Corporates, Law firms, Universities, SMEs, Individual inventors and Research scientists. For more details please visit https://www.einfolge.com/
Author: Neetu Singh - Media Marketing Manager at Einfolge
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