Delhi High Court: Navin Chawla, J. restrained a website myshoeshop (‘defendant 1') from selling shoes having NB Device mark (‘plaintiff'). The website also sold counterfeit/fake shoes of high-end popular brands violating their trademark rights as well.
The plaintiff is a company incorporated under the laws of the State of Massachusetts, the United States of America and is engaged in the design, manufacture, marketing, and sale of footwear since the year 1906 in the USA, including in the mark “NEW BALANCE”, “NB Device Mark” and the “N Device Mark”. Defendant 1 openly proclaims on its website, www.myshoeshop.in that what is being sold are the “first copy” shoes. The website, apart from selling the counterfeits/fakes of the plaintiff's footwear, also offers for sale/sells goods of other well-known brands such as Adidas, Louis Vuitton, Nike etc. at highly discounted prices.
The Court noted that the plaintiff has made out a prima facie case for grant of an injunction as having perused the contents of the website, prima facie it is clear that the defendant 1 is not only violating the trademark rights of the plaintiff, but other well-known brands as well causing irreparable loss even to the consumers. The balance of convenience also lies in the favour of the plaintiff and against the defendant 1.
Thus, the Court directed defendant 2 to provide contact details/addresses of the proprietor/registrants of the website www.myshoeshop.in and de-activate/block the said website till further orders.
The Court also directed defendant 5 and 6 to provide details of the subscribers of the telephone numbers along with the KYC documents as defendant 1 was offering the goods in question not only through the website but also through its mobile numbers and suspend/block the Instagram page, @myshoeshop_.
It further directed defendant 7 and 8 to issue necessary directions for blocking of the said website forthwith.
[New Balance Athletics v. Ashok Kumar Trading, CS (Comm) 531 of 2022, decided on 03-08-2022]
Advocates who appeared in this case :
For Plaintiff- Mr. Dushyant K. Mahant, Mr. Urfee Roomi, Ms. Janki Arun and Mr. Ritesh Kumar, Advocates;
For Defendant- Mr. Arnav Kumar, CGSC with Mr. Gurudas Khurana, Advocates for D-7.
*Arunima Bose, Editorial Assistant has put this report together.