A prior user of a trademark is entitled to an injunction restraining a subsequent user from using the same or a deceptively similar trademark for cognate goods, if the subsequent user's use is likely to cause confusion and deception among the consumers.

( 1 ) THIS appeal is directed against the order dated 18. 5. 1992 by which the application of the appellant under Order 39 Rules 1 and 2 was dismissed by the trial court. Brief facts giving rise to this appeal are that the appellant filed a suit for permanent injunction before the District Judge on the allegations that since the year 1980 the plaintiff company had been manufacturing and selling various goods. In the year 1986 the plaintiff and its predecessors started manufacturing and selling television picture tubes, parts thereof, video tapes and cassettes and television tuners etc. The said goods were sold under the trade mark prakash used in stylish manner. The trade mark of the appellant had become a symbol of quality with the consumers. The plaintiffs are the proprietors of the trade mark prakash in respect of the goods of the plaintiff since 1986. The goods are being sold on a large scale through out the length and breadth of the country. The trade mark" PRAKASH was used in a distinguishing manner in relation to the aforesaid goods on account of its open, regular, continuous and extensive user, coupled with large scale publicity and advertisement throughout the country and abroad through various media has acquired a secondary meaning and distinctiveness so much so that the said artistic trade mark prakash has come about to be exclusively identified and recognised with the said products of the appellants manufacture and none else. The appellants, during the past many years, have established large and extensive sale of their said products under the aforesaid artistic trade mark prakash which runs in several crores of rupees annually, and have acquired unique reputation and goodwill on account of the superior and high-standard quality of products. The appellants, therefore, have a right to restrain any person from using a trade mark or name which is identical with and/or deceptively similar to that of the appellants and such right extends not only to the particular goods sold by the appellants but alse to cognate/allied classes of goods as it is bound to lead unwary customers to mistake the goods manufactured by any other person for those goods, manufactured by the appellant. The goodwill and the reputation which the appellants have built up over the years had vitally helped them in increasing the annual turnover the years.

( 2 ) IT is further alleged that from an advertisement inserted in Navbharat Times dated 11. 11. 1991 the appellant came to know that the respondent also had adopted/started using the reputed artistic trade mark prakash of the appellants in respect of their products such as televisions, tuners, and T. V. Kits which are identical, cognate, allied and connected goods of the same description, nature as those of the plaintiffs, falling in the same class, without the permission, consent or authority of the appellants, is a mis-representation made by the defendants in the course of the trade to injure the business or goodwill of the plaintiffs and to cause potential damage to such business or goodwill. The use of the artistic word prakash with the identical or deceptively similar logo by the respondents is clearly mala fide and dishonest. The use by the respondents of the mark prakash in relation to their goods would be taken as indicating that such goods were the products of the manufacture of the appellant under their reputed and well known trade mark prakash or of a concern, associated or connected with the plaintiffs and would, therefore amount to passing off and would enable others to pass off. The appellant and the respondent s goods are identical, cognate, allied connected or associated goods of the same nature and description and are associated on account of the fact that these are displayed and sold side by side across the same counters in retail outlets such as electrical/electronic shops. The appellant s goods and those of respondent s have common trading channel as