A suit must be strictly classified as a commercial dispute under statutory definitions. A tortious claim like defamation, even occurring in a business context, does not inherently qualify as a commercial dispute unless it arises directly from the specific commercial transaction agreements defined by law.

JUDGMENT

I.A. 22224/2023

1. The present application under Order VII Rule 11 (a) and (d) read with Section 151 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 has been filed by the Defendant No.1 seeking rejection of the Plaint inter alia on the grounds that the instant Suit does not qualify as a „commercial dispute‟ in terms of Section 2(1)(c) of the Commercial Courts Act, 2015 [“CC Act”].

2. The instant Suit has been filed for a decree of permanent injunction in favour of the Plaintiff and against the Defendants, restraining the Defendants and/or its affiliates, directors, shareholders, representatives and assigns, from directly or indirectly, defaming the Plaintiff by publishing false information and defamatory statement against the Plaintiff and maligning him and other reliefs including damages.

3. Facts of the case as borne out from the Plaint are stated as under:

(i) The Plaintiff, a post-graduate in Masters of Computer Applications, is a software programmer with over twenty-five (25) years of experience in IT technology, the Founder as well as one of the Directors of the Defendant No. 1 Company, i.e., M/s Ideal Prepaid India Pvt. Ltd.

(ii) The Defendant No. 1 Company, incorporated under the provisions of the Companies Act, 2013, having its registered office at B-94, Ground Floor, Ph-2, Aya Nagar Extension, Kh. No. 525/1, New Delhi – 110047, is a subsidiary of a South Africa-based company, M/s Holistic Technologies (Pty) Ltd., which has been impleaded as the Defendant No. 4 herein.

(iii) The Defendants No. 2 and 3 herein are also Directors in the Defendant No.1 Company, however, stated to be residing out of India. As such, it is the claim of the Plaintiff that he was responsible for all the clients as well as reputation of the Defendant No. 1 Company in India.

(iv) As per the Plaint, in the year 2004, the Plaintiff was working with M/s Oxigen Services Pvt. Ltd. [“Oxigen”], which was one of the Indian clients of the Defendant No. 4 Company. During this time, the Plaintiff was handling a software provided by the Defendant No. 4 Company to Oxigen, and in this regard, the Plaintiff also got in touch with one Mr. MordiKushnir, the Director of the Defendant No. 4 Company.

(v) Later in 2010, the Plaintiff joined M/s Mindtree Limited and moved to its on-site client, the American International Group [“AIG”] in Singapore.

(vi) In 2015, the Plaintiff returned to India and contacted the Defendant No. 4 Company with the vision of commencing similar operations in India as the firm was carrying out in South Africa. Though the Plaintiff and the Defendant No. 4 Company were sceptical as to whether such a business would be successful or not, both parties came to an agreement that if the business picks up, the Plaintiff would get 25% share equity. This led to the formation of the Defendant No. 1 Company, wherein the Plaintiff and the Defendants No. 2 and 3 were the Directors.

(vii) The Defendant No. 1 Company did not see a lot of revenue generation initially, which prevented the Directors from heavily investing in it. For this reason, it is stated that the Plaintiff‟s father used to supply meters to the Defendant No. 1 Company on a six months‟ credit basis.

(viii) The Defendant No. 4 Company‟s product did not perform well in the Indian market. Ultimately, the Plaintiff was asked by the Defendant No. 4 Company to develop his own product, both hardware and software to suit the Indian market. Accordingly, the Plaintiff developed his own product, which ended up being successful in the market.

(ix) In January, 202