The central legal point established in the judgment is the illegal and unlawful use of the mark 'GIVENCHY' by the defendants for co-branding their products, leading to the grant of a permanent injunction and the award of nominal damages and costs to the plaintiff.

Prathiba M. Singh, J.

1. The Plaintiff – LVMH Fragrance Brands SA. (hereinafter, ‘Plaintiff’), is a multinational luxury goods conglomerate, headquartered in Paris. The company was formed by the merger of Louis Vuitton with Moet Hennessy in 1987. It controls 60 subsidiaries across the globe, ‘GIVENCHY’ being one of them. ‘GIVENCHY’ is a French fashion, accessories and perfume brand, founded by Count Hubert de Givenchy in 1952. M/s Parfums Givenchy S.A. France, the predecessor of the Plaintiff company, was established in 1957 and since then ‘GIVENCHY’ has become renowned brand for fragrances, perfumery and other cosmetics worldwide. The Plaintiff’s products are claimed to be sold in more than 100 countries in the world. In India, the Plaintiff’s mark ‘GIVENCHY’ is registered in several classes including classes 3, 18, and 25, as stated in paragraph 7 of the plaint. It is the case of the Plaintiff that the mark ‘GIVENCHY’ is also an essential part of the domain name and website www.givenchy.com.

2. The Plaintiff avers that in the last week of April, 2014, it came across various counterfeit products with the trademark ‘GIVENCHY’ and came to know that the said products are being promoted through various social media platforms. The original Plaint impleaded Defendant No.1 as M/s. Smart Collection. Mr. Yasin Sayani original Defendant no.2 claimed that he was the owner of the trade mark ‘SMART COLLECTION’. Hence M/s. Smart Collection was deleted vide order dated 6th October, 2015. An amended memo of parties was thereafter filed. Mr. Yasin Sayani, Mr. Danish Sayani, Ms. Yasina Sayani, M/s Floressence Perfumes Pvt. Ltd, M/s CrisModa Perfumes Pvt. Ltd., are defendants 1-5. Defendant No.6, is M/s Singh Collection and Defendant no.7 is M/s Cosmic International. There are no allegations against Defendant Nos. 6 and 7.

3. The claim of the Plaintiff is that the sale and promotion of these products is violative of the Plaintiff’s rights in the trade mark ‘GIVENCHY’, and since the products are counterfeit, an injunction is liable to be granted.

4. In a common written statement filed on behalf of the Defendant Nos.1-5, & 7, it was claimed that the Defendant No.1 – M/s. Smart Collection does not exist, but is a trademark owned by Defendant No.2 i.e. Mr. Yasin Sayani. Thus, the Defendants did not dispute that the mark ‘SMART COLLECTION’ emanated from their stable of products. The Defendants, however, challenged the territorial jurisdiction of this Court. It was claimed that the Defendant No.5 – Cris Moda Perfumes Pvt. Ltd. is not a company. It is actually a sole proprietary concern of Mr. Danish Sayani by the M/s. Cris Moda Parfums. It is claimed to a small scale industry which manufactured and marketed its own perfumes under their registered trademark ‘Cris Moda Parfums’. It is also claimed that the mark ‘Cris Moda Parfums’ was assigned by Defendant no.4 to Defendant no.5. According to the Defendants, M/s. Singh Collections has been impleaded only for the purposes of vesting territorial jurisdiction in this Court. There is no connection between the other Defendants and M/s. Singh Collections. The Defendants also categorically stated in the written statement as under:-

“25 to 31. The Contents of paras 25 to 31 of the plaint are incorrect, wrong and denied. Plaintiff is put to strict proof thereof. It is submitted by the Defendants that the suit is bad on account that the present Defendants have never sold any products with the trademark GIVENCHY. Therefore, the Defendants have no reason to sell goods with a false description or have ever indulged in counterfeiting of the Plaintiff products. The question of selling products with phonetically, visually and structurally similar marks of the Plaintiff products does not arise, nor have the Defendants copied the artistic work or copyright of the Plaintiff or have tried to give false description or have ever tried to link themselves with the customers of the Plaintiff. The Defendants have their own