IP Intelligence › Patent Criticalities › Nobody enforces your patent for you
Patent criticality
Nobody enforces your patent for you
A competitor is copying us. Will the Patent Office stop them?
Granting a patent and enforcing it are done by completely different institutions. The Patent Office has no role once a patent is granted - enforcement is a civil action that you start, fund and prove.
What enforcement actually involves
A suit in a court with jurisdiction, in which you must prove that the defendant's product or process falls within your claims, element by element. The defendant will almost always counterclaim for revocation, so you are defending validity at the same time.
Interim relief is where most Indian patent litigation is really decided, and at that stage the question is largely whether the defendant has raised a credible challenge to validity. A patent that looks strong on paper can fail that test.
What to do before you start
Get an independent view on validity, including a fresh invalidity search. Read your own prosecution history and identify every concession that will be quoted back at you. Map the defendant's product against each claim element in writing. And decide what outcome you actually want - an injunction, damages, a licence, or simply for them to change the product.
Often a well-evidenced letter achieves the commercial objective. Sometimes it provokes a revocation petition. Which of those is likely is worth thinking about before sending it.
Sections 48, 104, 106, 107 and 108 of the Patents Act 1970; groundless threats under section 106.
Indian courts have declined injunctions even where infringement was found, ordering rendition of accounts instead, and have granted interim security deposits in standard-essential patent disputes.
Treat the first letter as the most important document in the dispute. Section 106 makes unjustified threats actionable.
Sending a cease and desist letter without first checking your own validity position.
Your prosecution history, which the other side will read before replying.
Before contacting anyone, produce a claim chart mapping their product to your claim, feature by feature.
Sources & further reading
- The Patents Act, 1970 (consolidated to 1 August 2024) — Official IP India text
Related
Infringement
Doing, without the patentee's permission and in the country where the patent is in force, something the patentee has the exclusive right to do - making, using, offer…
Claim construction
The process of deciding what the words of a claim mean, read purposively, through the eyes of the person skilled in the art, in the light of the specification and dr…
Someone copied my technology. What are my options?
Working out what you actually have, before writing to anyone.
The case turns on what one word means
Before anyone asks whether a product infringes, the court decides what the claim means. That single decision then governs both infringement and validity - which is w…
Not sure whether this applies to your invention?
The honest answer usually needs someone to look at your actual disclosure, your timeline and the prior art. That is a conversation, not an article.
Educational guidance, not legal advice. This material is published by Ragulika IP for general education and information. It is not legal advice, it does not create a professional-client relationship, and it is not a substitute for advice on your own facts. Patentability, infringement, prosecution strategy and every other IP outcome turn on the specific facts and on the law and Patent Office practice as they stand at the time you act. Please take professional advice before making a decision, and read the underlying provision or judgment before relying on any point stated here.
Last reviewed by Ragulika IP on 2026-08-23. Indian patent law and Patent Office practice change; check the position before you rely on it.