Correa Nixon Henry, Pradhan Aditya Anil, Ubaae Ajay Ganesh and Ubale Sangita Ajay (Co-patentees) filed a suit in the District Court in New Delhi under the Patents Act, 1970 seeking permanent injunction restraining Star from infringing their registered patent and direction for rendition of accounts.
The case filed on June 14 came up for hearing thrice before a vacation court, which refused to grant interim injunction (stay) to the plaintiffs. On the last date of hearing on June 22, Star India filed its reply terming the suit as vague and not maintainable.
It alleged the patent obtained by the plaintiffs was fraudulent and prior anticipated by other foreign patents. It filed a separate application under Section 104 of the Act challenging the validity plaintiffs' patent.
As the District Court did not have jurisdiction to decide a challenge to the validity to a patent, Additional District Judge P K Saxena sent the matter to the Delhi High Court.
Both the parties have been directed to appear before Delhi High Court Registrar General V B Gupta on Tuesday. "What we have challenged is the process for selection of participants at the first entry level and not the subsequent stages or the game (KBC-2) itself," plaintiffs' counsel Ajay Sahni and N K Bhardwaj said.
The first round for selection of participants to enter the contest for the 'Hot Seat' of KBC-2 game show commencing next month was conducted during June 6 and 20
and a further round was expected next month.
The plaintiffs submitted that they were granted patent on January 20, 2005 with regard to an apparatus for playing a quiz game of skill playable by remotely located participants simultaneously logged in and competing with each other using an electrical or electronic network for date exchange and a control system for establishing a virtual universe.
The patent registration certificate grants to the plaintiffs the exclusive right to prevent third parties from indulging in any Net Related Interactive Quiz Game without the consent of the plaintiffs, as it would amount to infringement of their rights, they said in the suit.
The plaintiffs, who gathered information about KBC-2 game show from Star India Pvt Ltd website, submitted that a bare perusal of the details mentioned on the defendant's website would make it obvious that the process employed for selection of participants to enter the 'Hot Seat' was a complete violation of their patent rights.
Star India Pvt Ltd submitted in its written statement that the systems used by KBC-2 were traditional systems of communication, which were already in public domain and the plaintiffs could not claim proprietary rights over such traditional systems.
"It is clear that the present suit has been filed merely to stall the launch of KBC-2, tarnish the reputation of the defendant and a ploy to extract some money...," Star said in its reply.
