INDICA BOTTLING Vs. ARCHIAN FOODS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Briefly stated, the facts of the case are that plaintiff M/s Archian Foods, a Partnership Firm (herein respondent) through its Chief Marketing Officer and authorized representative, village Fatehgarh, District Roop Nagar has brought a suit for grant of permanent injunction against defendants i.e. M/s Indica Bottling, Industrial Area, Kurukshetra and its Proprietor Dharam Pal Singh (herein petitioners) craving for restraining the defendants or persons claiming under them from continuing their impugned action of passing off in the context of use, marketing, sale advertisement, export etc. of their product in the name and style of 'Mast Lahori Zeera' so as to safeguard the material and valuable rights of the plaintiff on the strength of their trade mark and further restraining the defendants from using identical trademark 'Lahori' both visually as well as phonetically to prevent further damage to the goodwill and reputation of the plaintiff and to avoid further confusion amongst the customers with imperfect memory and further requiring the defendants to jointly or severally act in accordance with law with regard to their trade policies and practices besides seeking recovery of stocks of defendants pertaining to the cartons, packages, bottles, labels and contents and for recovery of damages. That suit was filed in the Court of District Judge, SAS Nagar (Mohali) and was assigned to Additional District Judge, SAS Nagar (Mohali).

(2.) On getting notice, the defendants appeared and filed an application under Order 7 Rule 11 read with Sec. 151 CPC for rejection of the plaint on various ground, to wit, that the plaint does not disclose any cause of action; that the Court at Mohali lacks territorial jurisdiction to entertain and try the present suit since no act of passing off as alleged was committed within jurisdiction of the Court; that the defendants do not have any dealer, partner or agent within jurisdiction of this Court and not even a single bottle of 'Mast Lahori Zeera' has been sold by defendants within jurisdiction of the Court at SAS Nagar (Mohali); that the suit is not properly valued for the purpose of Court fee and jurisdiction.

(3.) The application was resisted by the plaintiffs.