SAYED NIZAMUDDIN Vs. GOLDEN TOBACCO CO PVT LTD

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The plaintiff is the appellant. It is a firm manufacturing and selling beedies under the name Taj Mahal and a device of Taj Mahal. The defendant in the suit is M/s. Golden Tobacco Co. P. Ltd. The suit was filed for a permanent injunction restraining the defendant company manufacturing and selling cigarettes under a name and device resembling the plaintiffs and from passing off their goods as that of the plaintiff and for nominal damages. The suit was dismissed by the lower court. Hence this appeal by the plaintiff.

(2.) The suit is filed with the following allegations : The plaintiff and his predecessors in interest have been carrying on business in the manufacture and sale of 'beedies' under the name and device of 'Taj Mahal' ever since the year 1910. The plaintiff firm and its beedies had acquired considerable popularity and reputation particularly in the regions of the States of Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu by reason of the intrinsic quality of the beedies, the skill of the firm and the drive and initiative and the publicity given to the goods. Soon after the Trade Marks Act, 1940, came into force the said trade mark of 'Taj Mahal' both the name and the device were separately registered by the plaintiff's parent firm in 1944. While so, the plaintiff learnt in December, 1968 through one of it distributors in Andhra Pradesh that cheap cigarettes of the defendant company under the name and device of 'Taj Mahal' were being sold in Guntur and Vijaywada. Soon after, the plaintiff caused a lawyer's notice dated 18.1.1969 (Ex.A.23) to be sent to the defendant company complaining that they are selling cigarettes under the same name and device of 'Taj Mahal' and its amounts to an invasion of the rights of the plaintiff. The defendant company replied stating that it had registered the name 'Taj Mahal' (not the device also) as its trade mark in the year 1951 for cigarettes and that it is not open to the plaintiff to complain. Thought the defendant company registered the name of Taj Mahal without the device of Taj Mahal, they did not use it until December 1968 and they had evidently abandoned it. When the correspondence was going on between the parties, in defiance of the protests of the plaintiff, the defendant company dumped its goods in Kurnool district also.

(3.) The name and mark Taj Mahal now adopted by the defendant company for its cheaper cigarettes at competitive prices are identical with or deceptively similar to the name and the mark of the plaintiff. The circumstances, go to show that the defendant had deliberately adopted that name and device for passing off cigarettes as those of the plaintiff with a view to cut into the trade of the plaintiff and capture their business and custom. The consumer public are likely to think in view of the striking similarity of the mark and the name that the cheaper cigarettes are the products of the plaintiff and to go for them even for a slightly higher price and give up purchase of plaintiff's beedies. Both 'beedies' and 'cigarettes' cater to the needs of the same smoking public. Both are manufactured with the same raw material viz. tobacco. The trade channel through which both reach the consumer public is the same being the ordinary shops and other retail and petty dealers. The plaintiff apprehends that their business would materially suffer by reason of the defendant company taking to sell their cigarettes with the same trade name and device of Taj Mahal. Therefore, the defendant company should be restrained from doing so by means of a permanent injunction.