What a registered design is
A registered design protects how a product looks: its shape, pattern, ornament or colours, as distinct from how it works or what it is called.
Under the Designs Act, 2000 a design covers the shape, configuration, pattern, ornament or composition of lines or colours applied to an article, and is judged mainly by sight. It does not cover a mode of construction or a mere mechanical device.[2] The Act replaced the Designs Act, 1911 and came into force on 11 May 2001.[2]
The legal framework
The Designs Act, 2000 and the Designs Rules are administered by the Controller General of Patents, Designs and Trade Marks. The provisions below are from the text of the Act.[2]
| Provision | What it says |
|---|---|
| s.2 | Definitions, including "design" and the "copyright" in a design: the exclusive right to apply the design to any article in any class in which it is registered. |
| s.4, s.5 | What cannot be registered (not new or original, already disclosed, not significantly distinguishable, scandalous or obscene matter). Applications are examined before registration. |
| s.11 | Registration gives copyright in the design for ten years from the date of registration. The proprietor can apply to extend it by a second period of five years, so fifteen years in all. |
| s.19 | Any interested person may petition to cancel a registration on grounds such as prior registration or publication, or lack of novelty or originality. |
| s.22 | During the copyright period it is unlawful, without the proprietor’s licence, to apply the design or a fraudulent or obvious imitation to an article for sale, or to import or knowingly sell such articles. |
Piracy and its remedies
Section 22(2) gives the proprietor a choice. The person who contravenes section 22 is liable either to pay the proprietor a sum recoverable as a contract debt, capped at INR 25,000 for each contravention and INR 50,000 for any one design, or to pay damages and face an injunction in a suit. Such suits cannot be brought in a court below the District Judge. Grounds for cancellation under s.19 may be raised as a defence (s.22(3)).[2]
Because the contract-debt route is capped, one explainer suggests proprietors with a serious infringement look to a suit and an interim injunction instead.[3]
Under section 15 of the Copyright Act, 1957, as summarised by one source, copyright does not subsist in a design registered under the Designs Act, and copyright in a design capable of registration ends once an article embodying it has been reproduced more than fifty times by an industrial process. For a mass-produced product, register the design early.[3]
How a design is registered
The Act requires examination before registration. I did not read the Designs Rules, so the stages below are in outline only.
- Check noveltyLook for earlier publications and designs, in India or elsewhere. Disclosure before filing can defeat novelty under s.4.[2]File before you launch
- Prepare the representationOne explainer notes that most refusals are for procedural reasons, so the form and representation sheet must follow the official guidelines closely.[3]Secondary source
- File and examinationApply for the article and its Locarno class. The Controller examines the application against s.4 and s.5.[2]Objections and reply
- Registration and renewalRegistration runs ten years from the date of registration and can be extended once by five years.[2]s.11
The numbers
Design filings rose about 41.52% in 2024-25, according to the Indian IP Office’s annual report.[1]
Design applications, 2024-25
Number of applications or designs. Source: IP India Annual Report 2024-25, chapter V.
The report gives 30,349 design registrations in its design chapter and 30,350 in a summary table. I quote the chapter figure.[1]
What this page does not cover
- The Designs Rules, fees and forms.
- Any case law. I did not research decisions on design infringement.
- Whether the Designs Act has been amended since 2000. The text I read is the WIPO Lex copy of the Act as enacted.[2]
- Section 15 of the Copyright Act and the Locarno details come from an explainer, not the statute or the Rules.[3]
References
Links are pages I opened while building this page. Where a source is a law-firm or explainer article rather than the Act itself, it is labelled secondary.
- IP India Annual Report 2024-25. ipindia.gov.in. Chapter V (designs).
- The Designs Act, 2000 (Act No. 16 of 2000). WIPO Lex, text and legislation record (enacted 25 May 2000; in force 11 May 2001). Sections 2, 4, 5, 11, 19, 22.
- An overview of design protection in India. Mondaq. secondary