subject: Trademark Counterfeiting in India [print this page] Article 61 of the TRIPS Agreement provides that Members shall provide for criminal procedures and penalties to be applied at least in cases of willful trademark counterfeiting or copyright piracy on a commercial scale. Under the U.S. federal criminal statute enacted in 1984, the act of counterfeiting covers the manufacture, distribution and sale of a product that bears a mark calculated to be indistinguishable from a genuine trademark. However, it is generally not only the trademark that is copied.The products that bear counterfeit marks are also often designed to closely simulate the style, appearance and construction of the genuine product associated with a genuine mark. The counterfeiting extends from the initial manufacture of the counterfeit product to the final sale of the fake to end consumers, including all intermediate steps in the distribution chain, such as exporting and importing the products.Counterfeiting in the trademark context includes the unauthorized use of a protected mark on goods that are manufactured, distributed and sold to consumers and falsely presented as the genuine product. The range of counterfeiting activities spreads far and wide, and has a significant impact on many aspects of the global marketplace. Trademark counterfeiting is a subset of trademark infringement20. All counterfeiters infringe, but all infringers do not necessarily counterfeit. In both counterfeiting and infringement cases, likelihood of confusion is the critical inquiry. The key difference is that, in counterfeiting cases, the defendant's mark is impossible or extremely difficult to tell apart from the plaintiff's.
Trademark Counterfeiting in India
By: Adv.Vishnu S
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