The Court considered the case and held that one who obtains registration of a common name or surname like JINDAL as a trade mark does so with all the risks that such registration entails and there is always a possibility of there being several such ‘Jindals.’
“It is open to anyone, and everyone, to use his name on his goods, and, therefore, the possibility of there being several JINDAL’s looms large. The plaintiff cannot, by obtaining registration for JINDAL as a word mark, monopolize the use of JINDAL even as a part – and not a very significant one at that – of any and every mark, even in the context of steel, or SS pipes and tubes. The Trade Marks Act, and the privileges it confers, cannot be extended to the point where one can monopolize the use of a common name for goods, and, by registering it, foreclose the rest of humanity from using it,” the Court said.
Justice Hari Shankar concluded there is no likelihood of confusion between the products of the two companies and no case for passing off is made out.
“No one, much less a consumer of average intelligence, who reads the text on the defendants’ impugned mark, would regard it is a mark of the plaintiff. The defendants’ impugned mark is clearly a source identifier, and identifies the product, on which it is used, with the defendants, and with no one else,” the Court said.
The interim injunction application was, therefore, dismissed.
Source: Barandbench
