Designs And Artistic Works: Microfibres’ Appeal Falls Through

The line between provisions of the Copyright Act and Design Law although independent of each other, find parties approaching the Court to debate these provisions increasingly. This is pertinently true of the definition of "artistic works" as in S. 2(c) of the Copyright Act, 1957 and the exclusión of works subject to copyright from the ambit of Design law. Addressing an appeal against the Ld. Single judge of the High Court of Delhi in the case of Microfibres Inc. v. Girdhar & Co. & Anr. (Suit No. 1480/2002), the Double Bench of the Delhi High Court dwelled on the question of interpretation of Section 2(c) of the Copyright Act read with Section 2(d) of the Designs Act and Section 15(2) of the Copyright Act and their interplay with each other. Noticing that issues of commonality also existed with two other appeals, viz. Mattel Inc & Ors v. Jayant Aggarwalla & Ors. FAO(OS) NO. 447/2008 and Dart Industries Inc. & Anr v. Techno Plast & Ors. FAO(OS) NO. 326/2007 the division