1. The suit herein i.e. C.S. No. 979 of 2007, I am informed, is tagged with another suit, i.e. C.S. No. 1111 of 2007. I am also informed that the two suits have been set down for joint trial.

2. Adversaries in the two suits are TVS Motor Company Limited, Chennai and Bajaj Auto Limited, Pune. The ranks of the two adversaries are reversed in the two suits. Therefore, to avoid confusion and for the sake of convenience and clarity, in this order, I shall refer to TVS Motor Company Limited, Chennai as TVS and Bajaj Auto Limited, Pune as Bajaj.

3. This Commercial Division is also informed that the factual matrix out of which the two suits arise is common. The nucleus or the eye of the storm, if I may say so for both the suits, is a registered Patent, being Indian Patent No. 195904 and Bajaj is the grantee of this Patent. This patent application is titled an Improved Internal combustion engine working on four stroke principle. This Indian patent is hereinafter referred to as 'said patent' for the sake of brevity, convenience and clarity. As said patent pertains to an engineering product in the auto mobile industry, it may be more appropriate to say that the said patent is the 'fulcrum' of the two suits and it is the epicentre of the lis.

4 These two suits, which are a decade old on the Original Side of this Court, were listed before this Commercial Division on 11.12.2017 when an application, i.e. A. No. 8210 of 2017, which is being disposed of by this order, was listed for hearing. With regard to jurisdiction of this commercial division, from a perusal of pleadings in the two suits and the submissions made by learned counsel for TVS and Bajaj before this court, it unfurls that both the suits pertain to alleged infringement of the said patent. While C.S. No. 979 of 2007 filed by TVS is regarding groundless threats qua the said patent inter-alia under Section 106 of the Patent Act, 1970, C.S. No. 1111 of 2017 filed by Bajaj is inter-alia to injunct TVS from infringing the said patent and this suit has been filed inter-alia under Sections 48, 104 and 108 of the Patents Act, 1970. To be noted, in this suit, validity of said patent has been assailed and put in issue (obviously by way of pleadings in the written statement) by TVS.

5. In the light of the aforesaid narrative, with regard to the two suits, Section 104(1) of the Patent Act, 1970 operates. The lis is also a commercial dispute within the meaning of sub-clause (xvii) of Section 2(1)(c) of the Commercial Courts, Commercial Division and Commercial Appellate Division of High Courts Act, 2015 (4 of 2016) (hereinafter referred to as Act 4 of 2016 for brevity). As section 104(1) of the Patents Act operates, specified value within the meaning of section 2(1)(i) read with section 12 of Act 4 of 2016 is not of any consequence. Therefore, this commercial division has jurisdiction to entertain these two suits and the applications therein in the light of the first proviso to Section 7 of the Act 4 of 2016.

6. Therefore, at the outset, it is made clear that this commercial division (to be noted, commercial division was notified in the Madras High Court with effect from 04.12.2017) has jurisdiction to entertain the aforesaid two suits and the applications therein, which includes the application which will stand disposed of by this order.

7. Mr. T.V. Ramanujan, learned Senior Counsel leading the counsel on record appears for Bajaj, which is the applicant in the instant application. Mr. C.S. Vaidyanathan, learned Senior Counsel leading the counsel on record appears for TVS, which is the respondent in the instant application.

8. I am informed that the said patent has a priority date of 16th July 2002. I am also informed that the said patent is valid till 2020. A patent is valid for 20 years. However, as the submissions are not disputed, in the light of the limited scope of this application, I am not delving further into this aspect of the matter.

9. This commercial division is informed that the