KOCHAR OIL MILLS LIMITED Vs. CHHATAR EXTRACTIONS LIMITED

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Plaintiff has sought for an ad-interim injunction restraining passing off by the defendants of its goods those as of the plaintiffs, in a suit seeking permanent injunction of a similar nature.

(2.) According to. the plaintiff it has been carrying on the business of manufactureing refined oil under the name and style of Pakwan from the year 1984. The trade mark having been invented, adopted and used ever since 1984 by the plaintiff, it has acquired a proprietory interest therein. The plaintiff has incurred substantial expenditure on popularising the trade mark. It is having substantial sales running into lacs per year. Shortly before the filing of this suit on 17.5.94 the plaintiff learnt that the defendant had started manufacturing and -marketing its own oil in the trade name of Pakwan which is likely to deceive unwary customers leading them into believing the defendant's oil to be of the plaintiffs'.

(3.) The plaintiff's prayer for the grant of ad- interim injunction has been contested by the defendant mainly on two grounds. It is not disputed that the plaintiff is a previous user of the trade mark Pakwan. However, it is submitted that the plaintiff had discontinued the user of the trade mark Pakwan sometime in the year 1986-87. The defendant made enquiries from the market and learnt of the plaintiff's trade mark Pakwan being not in its user and so defendant came to the market bonafidely in the year 1993-94 alongwith the trade mark Pakwan on its product. Secondly, it is submitted that Pakwan is descriptive of merely a quality of the food products and so the word is incapable of being acquired as a trade mark.