Union Minister Piyush Goyal held a review meeting at the Controller General of Patents, Designs & Trade Marks in Mumbai today. The Minister took review of the various initiatives undertaken by the Office of Controller General of Patents, Designs and Trademarks. The Union Minister reiterated Government’s commitment to bolster the ecosystem of patents, design, trademarks, GI systems; to encourage innovation, research & development in the country and bring newer inventions & knowledge from India's heritage systems to global platform. With this vision the efforts are being made since 2014 to make India as Global Innovation hub, he added. Union Minister while speaking about the CGPDT’s speedy disposal of applications informed that, “The pendency in the IPR department has come down drastically. It has also been decided that any pending application should be completed within days and not months.”Shri Goyal also mentioned about the reduction in fee allowed by the department in order to help and support startups and women entrepreneurs in the country. “Filing fees for Startups, MSMEs, Female individual has been given a provision of 80% discount to help the youth of the country. Also, most of the process are made online for their convenience. Earlier people from far off places had to spend money from their pockets to reach the office in person which has now been made easier. This ensures hassle free administration,” he said. He also appreciated the officers in achieving this task.“All these steps will encourage research, innovation, development and scientific thinking in the country,” he added.Shri Goyal also made a few suggestions to make the whole process more user friendly. He made suggestion to make a plan to increase awareness of GI and also to consider instituting scholarships for students studying the IP law as well as engage faculty from renowned institutions on a part time basis to help with examination.
Officials of CGPDT briefed how the IP process has been simplified and streamlined than before and also about the re-engineering of the whole process. Given below are a few common features of the amended Patent & Trademark Rules:
Timelines are imposed for speedy disposal - number of adjournments has been limited in hearings.
Special provisions made for Start-ups & MSMEs
E-filing encouraged through 10% rebate in fees
Hearing being done through video-conferencing facility
E-mail as mode of service
Procedural inconsistencies and unnecessary blocks in speeding up disposal removed by amendments.
CBDTM further elaborated on the various steps taken to ensure ease of access, and transparency as well as prompt dissemination of information regarding IPRs. The steps include login-free online data availability for all IPRs in IPO website, real-time basis status of IP applications, Indian Patent Advanced Search System (InPASS),Weekly publication of online journals for all IP applications, launch of Mobile Application for IPR, SMS Alert to help applicants on updates regarding deadlines in r/o office actions etc.
Timelines for Expedited Examination:
It was also mentioned that special care is being given to expedite examination of patents filed especially for applications filed by Startups, Female individual, Small entity and applications pursuant to bilateral agreement with foreign Patent Offices etc.
Timeline details as mentioned below:
Examiner to give Examination Report to controller within 1 month, but not exceeding 2 months from date of reference by the Controller.
Response to FER within 6 months (with extension of 3 months)
Controller to dispose of the application within 3 months of the receipt of response from Applicant
India has been progressively going up in Global Innovation Index (rank from 81 in 2015 to 48 in 2020). While assessing impact of measures taken, it was noted that - 96% of the patents are done through e-filing. E-filing has increased from 30 % to more than 95 %. Examination of the same has gone up by 223% in 2020-21 when compared to 2014-15. Domestic Filing accounts of 42% of the total patents and the percentage of domestic filing in comparison to the total filing has risen from 9911 in 2012-13 to 24303 in 2020-21.
Joint Secretary, DPIIT (CGPDTM) Rajendra Ratnoo, Director, Ms. Poonam Singh, Deputy Controller of Patent and Design, Dinesh Patil, Deputy Secretary, Kalyan Revella, Deputy Controller of Patent and Design, Amerandra Samal, Joint Registrar of Trade Marks, Satyendra Pandey and Deputy Registrar of TM & GI S.D. Ojha were also present.