The Delhi High Court has passed a John Doe/Ashok Kumar order granting ex parte ad interim injunction in favour of the fully integrated logistics provider Delhivery Limited in a trademark infringement suit. The injunction has been granted against an entity of individuals who were colluding with each other and perpetuating a scam by unauthorizedly using Delhivery Limited’s trademarks and literary work.
The dispute arose when the Plaintiff, a well-known logistics company Delhivery Limited (Plaintiff), with multiple industry awards, approached the Delhi High Court alleging large-scale trademark misuse and fraud. It claimed that an unidentified network of individuals was impersonating Plaintiff’s employees/executives to exploit its brand reputation. The Defendants were accused of unlawfully using the Plaintiff’s registered trademarks “DELHIVERY” and copyrighted document “Delivery Franchise Prospectus”. Using deceptively similar domain names and email IDs, the impersonators allegedly offered fake franchise and delivery services by targeting unsuspecting individuals and thereby extracted money under false pretences. The Plaintiff asserted that the alleged misuse was causing reputational harm and financial loss to the Plaintiff and is a pure violation of its right under Section 28/29 of the Trademarks Act, 1999, and Section 14 of the Copyright Act 1957. The Plaintiff impleaded the Banks, telecom service providers, domain registrars, and payment authorities to trace the perpetrators.
The Court found that the Defendants were using an identical or deceptively similar mark, “DELHEVERY”, in relation to the same services as those offered under the Plaintiff’s “DELHIVERY” mark. Observing that the Plaintiff had successfully established a prima facie case of trademark and copyright infringement, the Court held that it was entitled to an ex parte ad-interim injunction against the Defendants.
Justice Jyoti Singh issued several directions to various authorities who are impleaded in the infringement suit to immediately curb the ongoing infringement and assist in identifying the perpetrators. It directed the concerned domain name registrars to suspend and lock the impugned domain names belonging to the Defendants. Banks were ordered to furnish the KYC details of the accounts linked with the infringing activities and to block or suspend those accounts and associated UPI IDs. Further, the Telecom service providers were directed to disclose the names, contact details, and addresses of the persons using the impugned mobile number involved in the aforesaid infringement.
Appearances:
For Plaintiff: Mr. Essenese Obhan, Ms. Anjuri Saxena and Mr. Mudit Singh, Advocates.
