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2013 (9) TMI 349 - DELHI HIGH COURTPermanent Injunction - Infringement and Passing Off of Registered Trademark “easyJet” - Suit for permanent injunction restraining infringement of registered trademark, passing off, delivery up and damages has been filed by Plaintiffs - Held that:- The defendants must be permanently restrained from using the plaintiff’s trademark easyJet or any other deceptively similar mark - The plaintiffs had successfully established prior use of the suit trademark from the year 1995 - the reputation of the plaintiff had spilled over into India, as was evident from the coverage given to the plaintiff airline by Indian publications and the business generated by the plaintiffs from customers in India - This coupled with the fact that the defendants were using the plaintiff’s coined trademark in respect of services that were covered under Class 39, for which the plaintiffs hold a valid and subsisting registration. The plaintiffs had established prior use of the trademark since 1995 - when it was first registered, and since 1998 when their services became accessible to Indians via their website - if the plaintiffs have customers in a country, it can be presumed that they enjoy a reputation in that country - Owing to the fact that Indians could access the plaintiff no 2’s services through its website as far back as in 1998 - the same was sufficient to constitute prior use - By virtue of Section 28 of the Act, a registered proprietor of the trademark had the exclusive right to the use of the trademark in relation to the goods and services in respect of which the trademark was registered and to obtain relief against infringement of the trademark. The plaintiff and the defendants were operating in the same sphere of activity - The services provided by the plaintiff and defendants were identical in nature - Therefore, the likelihood of confusion and deception was strong on account of the public at large associating the defendants services to be those offered by the plaintiff - The acts of the defendants in using the impugned trademark coupled with a lack of plausible explanation offered by the defendants for the same, leads to the conclusion that the defendants were in fact passing off their services as those of the plaintiffs in an attempt to cash in on the plaintiff’s reputation worldwide as well as in India. The plaintiff had been vigilant about protecting and defending its intellectual property rights - The plaintiff’s intellectual property rights had also been protected by international dispute resolution bodies such as WIPO - WIPO administrative panel decision wherein the respondent was ordered to transfer the domain name easyjets.com to the plaintiff in the present suit on the grounds that it was confusingly similar to the trademark in which the plaintiff had rights.
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