The court upheld the plaintiff's exclusive rights to the registered trade name, confirming the likelihood of confusion and justifying the temporary injunction against the defendants.

JUDGMENT :

M. A. ABDUL HAKHIM, J.

1. Appellants are the defendants in O.S. No.34/2018 on the files of the Second Additional District Judge, Ernakulam, filed under the Trade Marks Act, 1999. The defendants are challenging the order of a temporary injunction granted by the Trial Court in I.A. No.5581/2018 filed by the plaintiff, restraining the defendants and persons claiming under them from offering educational services by using the trade name ‘GLOBAL PUBLIC SCHOOL’ as their trade name or as part of their trade name.

2. The short facts necessary for the disposal of this Appeal alone are stated: The respondent/plaintiff is a Trust by name, Global Education Trust. The plaintiff established a school by name Global Public School in the year 2006 and has been running the same at Thiruvaniyoor and kindergarten schools at Padamugal and Panampilly Nagar, all in Ernakulam District. The Global Public School of the plaintiff is affiliated to the Central Board of Secondary Education, New Delhi, and follows the syllabus prescribed by the said Board. The plaintiff has obtained registration for their trade name ‘GLOBAL PUBLIC SCHOOL’ in India under Trademark No.1476968 in Class 41 with effect from 07.08.2006. The case of the plaintiff is that on 12.07.2018 certain parents of the students brought to the notice of the plaintiff that the respondents have been using the name Global Public School as a part of their name as ‘LAKE MOUNT GLOBAL PUBLIC SCHOOL’ and thereby disguising the second respondent school as an establishment promoted by the plaintiff or of an affiliate or as a franchise by the plaintiff. The plaintiff claims that, being the registered proprietor of the trade name GLOBAL PUBLIC SCHOOL, the plaintiff has the exclusive right to use the same and the use of a name which incorporates the whole trade name of the plaintiff without permission of the plaintiff by the defendants is infringement of the trade mark of the plaintiff.

3. The defendants resisted the contention, contending inter alia , that the second defendant school has been functioning since the year 2010. The defendants have never adopted or used the trade name GLOBAL PUBLIC SCHOOL and have caused damages to the plaintiff. The names of the plaintiff and the defendants are distinctively different, and no one could pass off one for the other. There is no passing off or infringement from the part of the defendants by using the name LAKE MOUNT GLOBAL PUBLIC SCHOOL. The words GLOBAL, PUBLIC and SCHOOL are generic words and hence the plaintiff cannot claim exclusive right over these words as the word GLOBAL PUBLIC SCHOOL is neither an invented nor coined word.

4. The Trial Court granted the aforesaid temporary injunction as per the impugned order after considering the rival contentions and the materials before it.

5. I heard the learned Counsel for the appellants, Sri. J. Abhilash and the learned Senior Counsel for the respondent, Sri. P. Viswanathan, instructed by Adv. Sri. Ajith Viswanathan.

6. The learned Counsel for the appellants contended that the trade names of the plaintiff and the defendants are not deceptively similar to one another. The learned counsel invited my attention to the definition of the word ‘deceptively similar’ under Section 2(1)(h) of the Trade Marks Act, 1999, which provides that a mark shall be deemed to be deceptively similar to another mark if it is so nearly resembles that other mark as to be likely to deceive or cause confusion. The learned counsel contended that both the names are ph