The Delhi High Court has held that writs against orders passed by the Intellectual Property Appellate Board (IPAB) prior to its abolition can be heard and decided by the Single Judge.
The single bench of Justice C.Hari Shankar has said that there is no provision in the IPD Rules, which requires such writ petitions to be dealt with by Division Benches, the exception in Rule 2(l)(iii) does not alter this position.
The judgment addresses the issue of whether writ petitions, challenging orders passed by the Intellectual Property Appellate Board (IPAB), filed before abolition of the IPAB on 4 April 2021, would have to be heard by a Single Bench or by a Division Bench of this Court.
y order dated 28 June 2013, the learned Intellectual Property Appellate Board (the IPAB) has allowed rectification petitions filed by the second respondent, challenging the registration of the mark “AYUR” in favour of the petitioner. Aggrieved thereby, the petitioner has preferred the present writ petitions under Article 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India.
A serious preliminary objection has been advanced by the respondents, to the effect that these petitions have necessarily to be listed before a Division Bench of the Court and cannot be heard by a Single Judge.
The petitioners submit, per contra, that these writ petitions have necessarily to be heard by a Single Judge and cannot, per statute, be initially listed before a Division Bench.
The court stated that even if one were to take this exception into consideration and, based on Rule 8(iii), take the DHC rules also into account, writ petitions against orders passed by the IPAB would still have to be heard by Single Judges, as they fall within Rule 1(xviii)(a) in Part B of Chapter 3 of the DHC Rules.
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