The Hindu : Awareness on IPR poor in India, say experts

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Mar 28, 2004

Kerala

Kerala

Awareness on IPR poor in India, say experts

By Our Staff Reporter

KOCHI, MARCH 27. The need for launching an awareness drive on the Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) and keeping a vigil against piracy were stressed by experts at a meeting convened by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) here today.

S.N. Maity, Controller General of Patents & Design, Mumbai, Tomin J. Thachankari, IPS, Justice K.S.Radhakrishnan, K.K.M. Kutty, Chairman, CII Southern Region, lawyers from New Delhi and Bangalore were among the speakers.

Mr. Maity felt that though the awareness was very poor in India, the new IPR regime would open up tremendous opportunity for Indians. Protection of intellectual property was important under the WTO set-up and help was available from the four patents offices in India. Mr. Maiti, holding 40 patents to his credit, said the country, known for intellectual resources, should be able to produce at least 1 lakh patents under the changed scenario.

Mr. Thachankari, who had launched several anti-piracy drives in the past, disclosed that the majority of gadgets such as CDs, MP3s and DVDs available in the market were pirated. It was very difficult to distinguish between the original and the duplicate. The consumer was happy with the pirated version as it is cheaper. The piracy network used latest technology, much more advanced than the one used by the police. Conducting a raid itself was an extremely tough task. Even officials at the top were ignorant of the modern gadgets or technology employed by the pirates. All these factors were advantageous to the piracy business. This apart, Kerala did not have a forensic laboratory to examine whether a seized material is pirated.

Pointing out that coordinated efforts were needed from various agencies to thwart piracy, he said police were the only agency tackling the menace. He also opined that much of the cases in the future would relate to piracy in computer technology.

R. Muralidharan, lawyer and former professor of the National Law School of India University, Bangalore, described the IPR as the legal fencing that enabled the owners of the technology to carve out areas of monopoly in the market.

A live videoconference was held on the occasion in which K. Subodh Kumar of the CII and Somasekhar Naidu of the Bharat Biotech Limited spoke from Hyderabad. Mr. Naidu, in his address, said even micro-organisms could be patented if required.

Earlier, Justice Radhakrishnan, inaugurated the programme. Mr. Kutty, Chairman, CII Southern region; Geeta G. Menon and R. Harikkrishnan, lawyers; N. Sreekumar, Chairman, CII Kerala and V. Krishnamurthy, former Chief Secretary, spoke.

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