AIPPI (India) Group, representing over 100 active members from firms/ organisations having active Intellectual Property practice in India wrote a letter on 31 March,2020 to Mr. Piyush Goyal, Minister of Commerce in India requesting for suo motto adjournment of all IP filing time lines and deadlines at the IPO in view of the COVID-19 pandemic till May 01, 2020.
Letter has been written in reference to notice released by CGPDTM dated March 25,2020 in pursuance to nationwide lockdown declared by Central Government. The notice purports to extend deadlines till the day when the IP office opens pursuant to withdrawal of lockdown notification, which is presently April 15. It casts onerous burden on the right holders to file all extensions on a single day.
It was also mentioned that there are several deadlines in the various IP statutes, especially in patents, which are not extendable. Mr. Hemant Singh, President, AIPP(India) further wrote that it additionally casts a heavy financial burden on right holders to pay for the extension, being already hard-pressed and suffering on account of business disruption, and all for no fault of theirs! It would additionally flood the IP Office with hundreds of extension applications.
The existing provisions in law provide for extension of timeline on account of delay caused by the applicant/right holder on their account, and therefore, fairly, subject to payment of official fee. However, not meeting the statutory or regulatory time line on account of compliance with locked down announced by the Government of India and shutting down of IP Office pursuant thereto, cannot be attributed to the members of the public. This is a typical case of “double jeopardy” which is not permissible and untenable in law, being arbitrary in nature.
All time lines prescribed in IP laws, statutory or regulatory, may be deferred by way of exclusion for the entire period of lock down, from the date of lock down announcement, i.e., 25th March 2020.
Suo moto deferment of all deadlines have been made by other governmental organizations like the EUPIO and EPO. Following are additional factors necessitating such exclusion /deferment of prescribe time lines:
- It would not be feasible for some practitioners (those who have not been able to procure essential TT/infrastructure to work from home in view of the lockdown) to meet all deadlines of the last 21 days on a single day.
- This may likely add to unprecedented website traffic on the online modules of the IPO which may lead to a crash on that day.
On a humanitarian front, the COVID-19 pandemic may affect many more citizens of India and it would be unfair to stress on meeting statutory deadlines of non-essential services in these trying times, when lives are being lost and more are at stake.
It was requested to favorably consider the above request and defer all timelines prescribed under IP laws during the period of lock down and issue a notification / administrative order to that effect urgently, said letter.
-India Legal Bureau