Design Law Declared by the Supreme Court of India

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.56042/jipr.v28i3.601

Keywords:

Design Law, Supreme Court of India, Law Declared, Article 141, The Constitution of India, The Designs Act 1911, The Designs Act 1957, Interpretation-Construction, Constructed Meaning, Principles, Bench, New, Original, Registration, Cancellation, Transfer of Suit, The Commercial Courts Act 2015

Abstract

By virtue of Article 141 of the Constitution of India (hereinafter, the Constitution), the law declared by the Supreme Court of India (hereinafter, the Supreme Court) are law of the land. The Supreme Court furtherance to its law-declaring power under Article 141 of the Constitution has declared design law only in three decisions. This Paper seeks to cull out the principles of design law declared by the Supreme Court in the last 72 years. There are only three reported decisions of the Supreme Court on the design law of which two are Division Bench decisions and one is Full Bench decision. Number of decisions per year is not even one. On an average, the Supreme Court has decided .04 case in a year, or one design case in 8,836.66 days or in 24.21 years. Since the number of reported decisions are very less so only few questions of design law have been answered by the Supreme Court. A review of decisions on the design law reveals that: (i) unlike the patent and copyright decisions, the Supreme Court has declared the design law in all the three reported decisions; (ii) no case is reported in which the constitutionality of The Designs Act, 2000, was challenged; (iii) no Constitution Bench or Single Bench decision is reported; (iv) no Chief Justice of India was on the bench in any decision; (v) the Court has unanimously declared the design law; and (vi) no dissenting or concurring judgment is reported.

Author Biographies

Aqa Raza, Jindal Global Law School, O.P. Jindal GlobalUniversity, Sonipat 131001 Haryana

B.A., LL.B. (Hons.); LL.M. (Gold Medalist) from Aligarh Muslim University

Assistant Lecturer at Jindal Global Law School, O.P. Jindal Global University, Sonipat 131001 Haryana

Doctoral Candidate at National Law Institute University, Bhopal 462044 Madhya Pradesh

Ghayur Alam, National Law Institute University, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh 462 044 India

Senior Professor of Law; IPR Chair; Registrar, National Law University, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh 462 044 India

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Published

2023-05-29