IPABs to be set up in metros

Bangalore, May 20 (UNI) Intellectal Property Appellete Board (IPAB) currently functioning only in Chennai will shortly have presence in other Metropolitan Centres also, Director in the Union Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) said today.

Inaugurating a one-day workshop of the EU-India Trade and Investment Development Programme (TIDP) on Capacity building Intellectual Property Rights, he said that current the IPAB Chennai was moving periodically to other cities. However, a decision has been taken by the Minsitry of Commerce to have similar Boards in other cities also. IPABs were set up to avoid delay in settlement of cases relating to intellectual property rights filed in various courts across the country, he added.

He also said that in a year's time patents, designs and trade mark registration would go online in the country and efforts were being made to accord patents much earlier. As against eight years before, patents in India were being currently six months after the registration was made. With a number of foreign players looking to India towards production base, the Department was considering reduction in time, he added.

The EI-India TIDP had launched a two year programme at a cost of 13.55 million Euro to enhance the trade between European Union countries and India. Currently India's trade with EU countries was hardly 1.5 per cent of the global tade of EU, similarly though EU a counted for 13 per cent of all Foreign Direct Investments in India from 1991 to 2005 it was less than 0.2 per cent of EU's total foreigbn investments during the period. The aim was to double the trade , Dr D Kebschull Chief Programme Coordinatoir of EU-India TIDP said.

The workshop aimed to elicit views from leading experts in strengthening IPR regime in India with specific focus on better enforcement.

The legal framework for IPR in India had been considerably strengthened in the recent past and it was now recognised that it was entirely TRIPS compliant.

Of the over 24,000 patent applications filed last year in India more than 80 per cent were from Foreign nationals and institiutions and this reflected the changing face of Indian IPR regime, speakers at the workshop said.

However, they said improvements in enforcement of IPRS need to be made and this could be achieved through training and exposure of practitioners to the best practices in the EU and else where.

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