Noting that their illegal acts were not innocent, but deliberate with a dishonest intention, Justice Pratibha M Singh of the Delhi High Court awarded Rs 25 lakh for damages and costs in favour of LT Foods Limited in a trademark infringement suit.
Justice Singh observed that the Raipur-based defendant’s “counterfeiting” was completely contrary to law and was also “diluting the reputation” and “goodwill” of the plaintiff company’s marks.
“There can be no justification for manufacturing and selling rice in counterfeit ‘DAAWAT’ branded packaging. Clearly, customers are being misled by the Defendant and the entire effort is deliberate and dishonest,” the judge added.
The plaintiff’s case was that it is engaged in the business of processing, marketing, and exporting food products including rice, and is using the word and device mark ‘DAWAT’ / ‘DAAWAT’ since 1987. The plaintiff stated that the mark ‘DAWAT’ itself was adopted in 1985 by one M/s Lal Chand Tirath Ram Rice Mills and was later assigned to the plaintiff-company in 2003.
According to the plaintiff’s case, the products bearing the marks ‘DAWAT’ / ‘DAAWAT’ have achieved enormous goodwill and reputation not only in India but also in several other countries around the world due to the strict quality control standards maintained by it. The plaintiff claimed that the marks ‘DAWAT’ / ‘DAAWAT’ are well-known marks with a significant sales turnover of more than Rs 700 crore in 2020-2021 and the sales promotion for the aforementioned marks is estimated to be worth Rs 33 crore in 2020-21.
The plaintiff’s grievance was that the Raipur-based Defendant was selling, storing, and distributing counterfeit ‘DAAWAT’ branded products and in 2021, the same came to his knowledge. Examining the products revealed that while it was claimed to be ‘Basmati Rice’, it was actually ‘Jawaphool Rice’, which actually did not meet the high-quality standards of Basmati Rice. The court was further apprised that the same product was rebranded as Basmati Rice and sold in branded ‘DAAWAT CHEF’S SECRETS BASMATI RICE’ packaging and that the defendant’s product packaging was also identical.
The court noted that the defendant company was using a ‘counterfeit packaging’ which was identical to the plaintiff’s packaging to sell Jawaphool Rice portraying the same to be Basmati Rice.
Considering the plaintiff’s reputation and the fact that ‘DAAWAT’ is a well-known mark in India, the suit is liable to be decreed”, the court held.
Conclusively, the court observed “The defendant is clearly indulging in blatant violation of the Plaintiff’s statutory and common law rights in the marks ‘DAWAT’ / ‘DAAWAT’. Moreover, considering that the product is rice for human consumption, the misrepresentation by Defendant that the same is Basmati Rice is also impermissible”.
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