Anglo Indian Trademark Law Case Study

TRADEMARK

According to Black’s Law dictionary, “Trademark is a distinctive mark, motto, device, or emblem, which a manufacturer stamps, prints, or otherwise affixes to the goods he produces, so that they may be identified in the market, and their origin be for.” In general parlance, trademark may be referred as a mark which distinguishes the good of on enterprise from the goods of its competitors. It is a mark used by the producers to make the easy recognition of the goods by the consumers and to ensure quality of the goods. The mark helps the good in establishing its own identity and prevents the low quality similar goods from replacing the good quality goods.

Section 2(1)(zb) of the Trademark Act, 1999 defines trademark as “trade mark”

The Anglo Indian trademark Law was also referred as the Bakers Marking Law. Bakers marking law as the name suggests required the bakers to place a mark on the loaves of bread which were sold by them, as a mark of distinctiveness or identity. The law of bread and beer assizes are considered to be the landmark in the history of Trademark law.

VENETIAN LAW

The first intellectual property Law evolved in The Venetian Law of 1474 .On March 19th, 1474 the Venetian Law declared “each person who will make in this city any new and indigenous contrivance, not made heretofore in our dominion, as soon as it is reduced to perfection…it being forbidden to any other in any territory and place of ours to make any other contrivance in the form and resemblance thereof, without the consent and licence of the author up to ten years”. The Venetian law through this declaration established that any person who comes up with a new idea or makes any new invention, it excludes others or forbids others to make any invention which is similar or resembles the invention already made. Any person making invention which is in contravention of the above said declaration and is made without the consent of the author or inventor would be treated as an infringement of the right of the

I the year 1940 the first Trademark law evolved in India. Earlier to 1940 there was no statutory legislation on Trademark. Section 54 of the specific relief act 1877 was used to solve the problem pertaining to infringement and law of passing. For the purpose of establishing ownership over the trademark the registering process covered under the Registration act, 1908 was used.

To deal with the various problems arising out of the use of trademark, the Trademark Act, 1940 was passed. The Indian Trademark act was significantly influenced by the English trademark. With the passage of time economy of India started developing rapidly and it accelerated the growth of trade and commerce. Soon, the situation was alarming and the Indian trademark Act was not sufficed to protect the Trademark. For this purpose Merchandise act, 1958 was passed with a view of providing better security and preventing the practices of using fraudulent marks on merchandise.

Trademark act 1940 was the first trademark legislation of India and subsequently it was amended in the year 1943. Earlier Trademark registry was the part of the patent registry but later a separate registry for the Trademark was constituted. Trade and merchandise act replaced the trademark Act of 1940 and it came into force on 25th November 1959. Several amendments were also made to the Trade and merchandise