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.

What Changed in Indian IP

The draft Patent Office Manual, 2026 is open for comment - and the window is short

Working statements moved from yearly to once every three financial years - and the first deadline is close

The examination request window shortened from 48 months to 31 - but only for new filings

New CRI Guidelines replace the 2017 version, and cover AI for the first time

Pre-grant opposition now has a fee and a filter in front of it

Reporting your foreign filings got much simpler

Foreign filing licence breaches are no longer criminal - in ordinary cases

Atomic energy inventions are no longer excluded as a class

The Delhi High Court closed the last argument for late national phase entry

There is now a working procedure for patent penalties

A refusal has to be reasoned, and confined to the objections you were actually told about

A divisional filed to answer a unity objection cannot then be rejected as already covered

Keep going.