Bharat group says ''Grand" is their brand name

New Delhi, Jan 7 (UNI) The Delhi High Court today directed the Bharat Group of Hotels and the Unison Group of Hotels to settle among themselves the issue of using the Brand Name 'Grand'.

The court directed as prefix or sufix with the name of their hotels and get back to the Court on February 19 to tell the outcome of their settlement.

The Bharat Group of hotels approached the Delhi High Court to set aside the Court order issued on March 26, 2004 by Justice OP Diwidi which says the name 'Grand' is a general name and cannot be made a brand and its use by others cannot be restricred.

They also asked the Court to restrict the Unison group to use the name 'Grand'instead of their original name 'Grand Hayyat'.

The Unison Group had removed the Suffix 'Hayyat' from their original name 'Grand Hayyat' in New Delhi after their contract with the Hyatt group had lapsed.

The Bharat hotels, who owns a chain of hotels worldwide, says that they have hotels with the name as'Grand Ashok', 'grand temple, khujaro', 'Grand Intercontinental' and so on and the use of the name "grand" by the unison group to their hotel which was earlier known as "grand Hayyat, 'and now after they have discontinued with Hyyat they have named the hotel as only "grand'.

This will hamper our business as all are registerations made by E-mails have the name 'grand' in it Ms Pratibha Singh, lawyer for Bharat groups said.

Mr TKGanju, lawyer for Unison group said that world over there are many names by the name of Grand and this is such a common and a general name that it cannot be registered as a brand name to any one group.

A bench Comprising justice Manmohan sareen and Justice Veena Birbal suggested both the parties to name their hotels as Grand unison and grand Bharat respectively as prefix or suffix to their names. The court said it will better if the hotels resolve the issue among themselves.

Bharat Group has objections against Unison Group to use the name Grand in a singular form. They can use it with some suffix their lawyer said.

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