India

2-1. Duration

• • Trademarks are protected for ten years. Trademark protection is extendable with filing of an application for renewal (India Trademark Act Section 25(1)).

2-2. Trademarks Subject to Protection

• • In addition to product trademarks, service marks are protected (India Trademark Act Section 2 [1] [zb]).
• • There is a system for collective trademarks (Section 61).
• • 3D shapes and color combinations are also protected (Section 2 [1] [m]).

2-3. Application

• • Because India is a member of the Paris Convention, an applicant may claim priority based on a Japanese trademark application.
• • As in Japan, India follows the single application for single trademark principle, but an applicant can specify multiple classifications in a single application (India Trademark Act Section 18).
• • An applicant may pay an additional fee to request an accelerated examination (India Trademark Rules Section 38 [1]).
• • If a rejection decision comes out as a result of examination, the applicant can file an appeal (India Trademark Act Section 91).
• • India has a system for challenging trademarks. Anyone can raise an objection within three months from the publication of the grant of the trademark (India Trademark Act Section 25 [1]).
• • There exist five trademark offices in India. In a case where a foreign applicant files a trademark application, which trademark office takes care of the application is determined depending on the place of residence of the local attorney.

2-4. After Registration

• • In renewal examination, no determination is made as to whether the registered trademark is actually being used.
• • Any interested party may request a trial for invalidation of a registered trademark (India Trademark Act Section 57).
• • If a registered trademark is not used for five years and three months, it may be subject to a trial for cancellation for non-use (India Trademark Act Section 47).
• • In a case where the agent of or the representative of the owner of a registered trademark registers that trademark under his or her own name without the consent of the owner, the owner is entitled to raise an objection against that registration (India Trademark Act Section 146). However, such an objection needs to be raised within three years of the acknowledge of that fact.

2-5. [Trademark] Revision on Fees Required under Madrid Protocol

Fees required for international trademark application under the Madrid Protocol were published. Those fees were laid down on November 15, 2017. Among the published fees, the fee required for designation of India were revised on January 11, 2018 as below (monetary unit: Swiss Franc).

* Note: Fees required on filing and on renewal, which previously differed between collective trademarks and other trademarks, were standardized. Although the revised fees are slightly lower than the previous fees for collective marks, the revised fees for normal trademarks except for collective marks are approximately twice the previous fees.

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