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23. In the recent case of M/s Allied Blenders and Distillers Pvt. Ltd. & Ors. v. Amit Dahanukar & Anr. 261 (2019) DLT 692, the plaintiffs sought protection of the marks 'MANSON HOUSE' and 'SAVOY CLUB' in This is a digitally signed Judgement.

NEUTRAL CITATION NO: 2022/DHC/001212 respect of alcohol. The defendants were ex-licensees of the plaintiffs. The plaintiff had filed a suit in 2009 in the Bombay High Court wherein the Bombay High Court had held in favour of the defendants by dismissing the plaintiffs' interim injunction application and the counter claim of the defendants had also been allowed. The Bombay High Court had also passed an interim order restraining the plaintiffs from introducing any products with the subject trademarks in the market without leave of the Bombay High Court. The defendants argued that the filing of the subsequent suit before the Delhi High Court by the plaintiffs, would be a case of forum shopping and owing to the principle of comity, the Delhi High Court ought not to adjudicate in favour of the plaintiffs. It was also observed by the Bombay High Court that the plaintiffs had filed the suit before the Delhi High Court while proceedings in Bombay were ongoing and injunction had been rejected already, and therefore the Bombay High Court restrained the plaintiffs from taking steps in the Delhi proceedings for some time. In view of all these facts, i.e., the parties being the same and the suits having commonality of interest, the ld. Single Judge of the Delhi High Court, held this to be a case of forum shopping and observed as under:

30. Keeping in view the legal position it is manifest that this court has to give due deference to the enunciation This is a digitally signed Judgement.
NEUTRAL CITATION NO: 2022/DHC/001212 made by another court especially when the litigants are the same. In my opinion, the above legal proposition squarely applies to the facts of the case. The plaintiff having filed suit based on identical facts before the Bombay High Court and having been declined an interim injunction cannot now try to overreach the said order of the Bombay High Court and file the present suit in Delhi High Court seeking an interim injunction. If this court were to agree with the contentions of the plaintiff and were to pass an interim order in favour of the plaintiff it would be passing an order wholly contrary to the order of the Bombay High Court."
"The Plaintiff in the year 2019, withdrew its injunction application filed in the year 2017 as the Defendant's took a technical objection that the interim injunction prayer does not mention the word passing off. Therefore, out of abundant caution, a fresh injunction application. It is pertinent to note that even after lapse of 5 years post the filing of the suit and despite the best efforts of the parties, the matter is still at the stage of interim injunction and the said application has not been decided till date. The Plaintiff shall be withdrawing the said suit."

NEUTRAL CITATION NO: 2022/DHC/001212 above shows that the Commercial Court is seized of the matter and submissions have been partly heard on the injunction application. The entertaining of this suit before this Court, would in effect mean that the Plaintiff would be permitted to argue again on merits and seek an interim injunction here, while the same matter is part-heard before the Commercial Court.

31. In view of all these reasons including identity of the cause of action, multiple reliefs being impermissible under Section 135 of the Trademarks Act and the present suit being filed during the pendency of the first suit, if the present suit is entertained by this Court, this would clearly encourage forum shopping by a litigant who has been unable to get relief in a particular forum and hence decides to knock the doors of this Court. The principle of forum shopping has been recently decried by the Supreme Court in Vijay Kumar Gupta (supra) where the Court has held as under: