SATISH KUMAR Vs. KHUSHBOO SINGH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The plaintiff Satish Kumar has instituted this suit against (a) Khushboo Singh; (b) Abhishek Chauhan; and (c) Aarya Fashion through its proprietor Khushboo Singh, for

(2.) It is the case of the plaintiff in the plaint, (i) that the plaintiff is the sole proprietor of Plasma Impex Inc. and is engaged in business of supplying, importing, exporting, manufacturing and production of all kind of merchandise and handicrafts, gifts, imitation jewellery, fashion accessories, carpets, durries, mats, rugs, linen, flannels, etc.; (ii) that the defendant no.1 Khushboo Singh was working as the General Manager of Plasma Impex Inc. since 19th March, 2012, until her termination on 31st October, 2017; (iii) that the defendant no.2 Abhishek Chauhan is the husband of defendant no.1 and was the Co-Director of another venture of the plaintiff in the name and style of Kraftstreet Fashion India Pvt. Ltd. and who also parted away from the plaintiff in October, 2017, stealing computer database, trade secrets and clientage of Kraftstreet Fashion India Pvt. Ltd.; (iv) that the defendant no. 2 has set up new proprietary in the name of defendant no.3 Aarya Fashion, dealing in similar business as the plaintiff; (v) the plaintiff has developed and maintained various confidential data and information regarding internal processes, specific client profile, client details, business strategy and methods, finances, client budget, pricing structure, upcoming projects, etc.; all this confidential information has been developed over a period of several years by putting in extensive efforts; (vi) that the defendant no.1, as an employee of the plaintiff, had access to some of its secret and confidential data during the course of her employment with the plaintiff; (vii) that the defendant no. 1, on termination of her employment, took wrongful possession of various important and confidential files, documents, records and the defendants are now using the same for their business in the name and style of defendant no.3; (viii) that the defendants, by accessing merchant3@plasmaimpex.inc and export@plasmaimpexinc.com, which are the official e-mail IDs of the plaintiff, have further taken the privileged information, customer database and other confidential data of the plaintiff and have procured certain emails of the plaintiff and produced the same before this Court in CS(OS) 668/2017; (ix) that the defendants were defaming the plaintiff and in which respect CS(OS) 668/2017 has been filed by the plaintiff against the defendants; (x) that on complaint of the plaintiff, FIR No.755/2017 was also registered against the defendants on 16th December, 2017 at police station New Ashok Nagar and defendants have stolen the clientage of the plaintiff by accessing the customer database of the plaintiff; (xi) the defendants, with the use of such privileged information has started dealing with the clientage of the plaintiff and are causing loss to the plaintiff; (xii) the customer database of the plaintiff is protected by copyright as an original literary work and being a compilation is a literary work within the meaning of Section 2(o) of the Copyright Act, 1957 and the plaintiff is the owner of copyright therein; (xiii) the said clientage of the plaintiff has been built over the years by making several foreign visits in different countries; (xiv) the defendants have caused injury to the plaintiff; (xv) on 6th December, 2018, an undertaking was recorded that the parties will not pursue any case against each other until the mediation proceedings are pending and it was due to this that the plaintiff could not file the suit immediately; and, (xvi) on 16th January, 2019, the plaintiff discovered that the defendants have again accessed the emails of the plaintiff; the defendants by doing so, got to know the latest client of the plaintiff in Sweden.

(3.) The suit came up first before this Court on 18th February, 2019, when attention of the senior counsel then appearing for the plaintiff was drawn to the dicta of this Court in Navigators Logistics Ltd. Vs. Kashif Qureshi,2018 SCCOnLineDel 11321 and it was enquired as to how the suit claim was within time.