MONTBLANE SIMPLO GMBH Vs. GAURAV BHATIA & ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The Plaintiff, Montblanc Simplo GmbH is a company, incorporated under the laws of Germany having its registered office at Hellgrundweg 100, Postfach 540340, D-22525 Hamburg, Germany. Mr. Flavio Mascetti is the authorised representative of the Plaintiff Company and is therefore competent to file the present suit. It is submitted that the plaintiff is engaged in the manufacture, distribution and sale of writing instruments and have been producing high quality products having extensive sales and have acquired a distinct and distinguished reputation and their name, Montblanc is one of the most widely recognised luxury brands in the world around and they were producing their writing instruments under this brand name. They have also started production of the celebrated writing under the brand name of Meisterstuck since 1924 which had a wide popularity. As a result of their consistent innovation in this field, plaintiff had introduced Meisterstuck Classique; Meisterstuck Classique Solitaire; Meisterstuck Solitaire Collection, Meisterstuck Special Edition - Unicef Meisterstuck Traveller, Meisterstuck Amadeus Mozart; Meisterstuck Le Grande; and Meisterstuck Ee Grande Solitaire. The plaintiff's Meisterstuck collection of writing has a distinctive traders comprising of unique get up which includes shape of goods, their packaging and combination of colours and incorporates the symbol 'the Star Device' which is a white stylized six-pointed star with rounded edges. This Star Device is found in entire range of products of the plaintiff and is the world renowned 'Three Ring Device' comprising of three metallic bands around the circumference of the pen which are located near the middle of the body of the pen cap. The world recognised the products of the plaintiff with this trade dress. Besides trademarks, Montblanc, Meisterstuck, the Three Ring Device and the Star Device, the Plaintiff has also secured multiple registrations of these marks and devices in several countries across the world and the trade mark Montblanc was first registered in the year 1910. The plaintiff also applied for registration of the mark Meisterstuck as well as the Three Ring Device relating to goods under Class 16 of the International Classification as per the Nice Agreement in countries such as Albania, Algeria, Argentina, Australia, Bangladesh, Benulux, Bosnia, Bulgaria, Chile, Central African Republic, Finland, France, Hungary, India, Japan, Lebanon, Norway, Nigeria, South Africa, Spain, Switzerland etc. These trademarks are also registered in India which are valid and subsisting.

(2.) It is submitted that defendant no. 5 is a company trading under the name of the Digaaz e-Commerce Pvt. Ltd. operating an e-commerce website www.digaaz.com where it is offering lifestyle and fashion products for sale and supplying counterfeit products bearing several registered trademarks of the Plaintiff. Defendant Nos. 1, 2 and 3 are the Directors of Defendant No. 5 and actively running, operating, steering and managing the day to day business of Defendant No. 5 and also operating the said website. Defendant No. 4 is believed to be an employee of Defendant No. 5 and is misrepresenting to the purchasing public that Defendant No. 5 is an authorised distributor of the Plaintiff. The domain name is registered in the name of Defendant No. l. It is submitted that the plaintiff came to know through its sales/service team in India in July 2013 that the defendants were selling counterfeit product of Montblanc writing instruments on their website www.digaaz.com at discounted rate of 75 % representing the product as that of the original product of the plaintiffs. It is submitted that the plaintiff had never sold its product on discounted rate.

(3.) The relevant portion is extracted in plaint as under:-