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2. The respondent (i.e. plaintiff before the Trial Court) has instituted a suit being I.P. (COM) No. 7 of 2024 praying inter alia for a decree of perpetual injunction restraining the defendants from passing off their products bearing the trade mark "METERIVA" as if the same are the goods of the plaintiff bearing the trade mark "METRAVI". Briefly summed up the plaint case is as follows.

(a) One Mr. Vikram Raj Bhansali started a business of marketing, selling and distribution inter alia of digital clamp testers, multi meters and electrical and electronic tests and measuring instruments (hereafter "the said products") falling within Class 9.

24. Referring to the factual narration in the plaint it was submitted that the respondent/plaintiff is a prior user and prior adopter of a well-known trademark "METRAVI" since 1st April, 1998, inter alia, for digital clamp tester, multimeter and electrical and electronic test and measuring instruments under class 9. It was submitted that the said mark was first adopted by the respondent/plaintiff's predecessor-in-interest Mr. Vikram Bhansali through M/s Arun Enterprise and that such well-known mark "METRAVI" (word) has been granted registration by learned Trade Mark Registry. It was further submitted that the respondent/plaintiff on 12th August, 1998 also obtained registration of the domain name (being www.METRAVI.com) which bears the mark "METRAVI" and that on March 25, 2009, the respondent/plaintiff company was incorporated bearing the trademark "METRAVI". Ms. Mitra submitted that the said trademark was transferred, conveyed and assigned to the respondent/plaintiff by its predecessor-in-interest on 17th December, 2015. Ms. Mitra stressed that the mark 'METRAVI' is being used continuously, uninterrupted, exclusively and openly by the respondent/plaintiff since 1998, for more than 2 (two) decades, though initially through its predecessor-in-interest.

42. The plaintiff's submission that it obtained registration of the domain name (being www.METRAVI.com) on 12th August, 1998 and that the plaintiff was incorporated on March 25, 2009 initially appeared to us to be totally absurd. However, upon perusal of the audited balance sheet for the year ended March 31, 2023 and connecting the same with the plaint case we could understand that the plaintiff has actually claimed to have been using the mark "METRAVI" since 1998 upon the mark passing hands from Mr. Vikram Raj Bhansali through the partnership firm named M/s Arun Enterprises to the plaintiff. We note that the case run in plaint is that Mr. Vikram Bhansali created the mark and adopted it first through the partnership firm M/s Arun Enterprises who in turn assigned it to the plaintiff. The said audited balance sheet reveals that the plaintiff is wholly owned by its four promoters namely Vidhya Bhansali (shareholding of 20%), Vikram Bhansali (shareholding of 35%), Vimal Raj Bhansali (shareholding of 20%) and Richa Bhansali (shareholding of 25%). The said balance sheet also reveals that Vimal Raj Bhansali, Vikram Bhansali and Richa Bhansali are its directors and that M/s Arun Enterprises is a partnership firm of the directors of the plaintiff company. The plaintiff is thus a new face of the same persons who have been using the said mark. Therefore, notwithstanding the fact that the plaintiff is a separate juristic entity which was created in the year 2009 and the mark alongwith the goodwill was formally assigned to it on December 17, 2015, the plaintiff does not prima facie appear to be wrong in claiming that it had been using the mark since 1998. The same in our prima facie view also explains the parsimonious consideration of the mark in the assignment agreement that was relied on by Mr. Basu in order to demonstrate absence of goodwill. The plaintiff has annexed a product catalogue showing the wide range of products (electrical and electronic test and measuring instruments) dealt in by it. The said annexure is followed by a number of invoices ranging from December 05, 2007 to September 12, 2022. The same prima facie reveal that the 2025:CHC-OS:81-DB plaintiff has been continuously dealing in electrical & electronic test and measuring instruments called by different names. The audited balance sheet of the plaintiff company for the Year ended March 31, 2023 reveals that its revenue from operations (i.e. sale of products as described in the notes forming part of the financial statements) stood at an impressive Rs.12,27,89,459/- (Rupees Twelve Crore Twenty Seven Lakh Eighty Nine Thousand Four Hundred and Fifty Nine) only. The same balance sheet also discloses the sales figure for the previous Financial Year to be Rs.9,11,17,267/- (Rupees Nine Crore Eleven Lakh Seventeen Thousand Two Hundred and Sixty Seven) only.

63. We also note that given the nature of the products dealt in by the parties, in the age of retail sale through online platforms, it cannot be said with certainty that all the products would necessarily be purchased by a class of informed customers only. Electrical and electronic test and measurement instruments which fall under class 9 and in which the rival parties deal is a genus which comprises a wide range of instruments, all of which are not necessarily used by well informed and educated people. While it is a fact that certain specialized equipment/instrument which require special technical expertise are used by technical experts yet there are many test and measurement tools which are used by a large section of people which may include normal technicians, electricians and even common people. Technicians, mechanics and electricians in our country 2025:CHC-OS:81-DB are mostly free-lancers and may not be attached to reputed organisations and therefore all of them may not be so well informed as to purchase a product after analysing the name of the company that has manufactured it. We feel that the dictum of the Hon'ble Supreme Court is meant to be applicable to cases where the entire class of persons is comprised of persons of the same standard in terms of intelligence, knowledge and understanding and not to a case of this nature which involves a heterogeneous class of purchasers.