Makers of clones or identically named versions of the Tirupati laddu, beware. You could be subjected to prosecution if found in violation of the intellectual property right of the laddus’s Geographical Indication (GI) tag.
The Madras High Court recently passed an ex parte interim injunction restraining a Chennai based company from preparing, selling and making laddus available to the public in the name and style or anything deceptively similar to the Tirupati laddu.
The Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam (TTD), the registered proprietor of the GI for Tirupati Laddu had filed a suit in the Madras High Court against the enterprise that was making and selling laddus bearing the name and style of the Tirupati Laddu.
Jyoti Kumar, Head, Andhra Pradesh Technology Development and Promotion Centre said, “This order could be the first of its kind in India, confirming the rights of a registered GI as against its unauthorised use by third parties.” The Tirupati laddu, which was awarded a registered GI tag a few years ago, is a revenue source for the TTD.
Recently, small time outlets have been selling special laddus branding them as Tirupati Type, Tirupati, Tirupati-like etc., misleading people to believe that the original laddus were being made available through these outlets while deriving surrogate advantages.
To curb this, the TTD had applied for registration under GI with the Registrar of Patents, Trademarks and Geographical Indications, India.
Comments
Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.
We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.