Can patent be revoked

Dear Dinkar Vidyarthi,

An aggrieved person can move an application before the Appellate Board or the High Court patent for revocation or cancellation of the patent. Some of the grounds include prior publication of the invention to the date of application or that the subject of claim is not an invention or that the application was wrongly filed or that the invention claimed is not new or that the invention is not useful or that the claim made in the specification is not properly based on the disclosure in the specification amongst others. An application for revocation has to be made before the High Court when the validity of a patent is challenged in response to an infringement suit. At other times, the revocation application has to be filed before the Appellate Board. Can a patent be surrendered? A patentee may give notice in the prescribed manner to surrender the patent. The controller may issue notice and hear objections, if any, and then allow or reject the request.

Mr.Dinkar,

The controller of patents grants patent to the true and first owner. A ptent may be granted jointly to several persons. He may also grant to a legal representative of the true and first inventor.

The true and first inventor means, not the first discoverer or inventor, but the first person who applies for a Patent.

Dear Dinakar,

Yes. You or any one can revoke the patent. Under Section 64 in Patent Act, the patent may be revoked by the High Court on petition by any interested person or of the Central Government or on a counter-claim in a lawsuit for patent infringements on the following grounds.

1. that the invention, so far as claimed in any claim of the complete specification, was claimed in a valid claim of earlier priority date contained in the complete specification of another patent granted in India;


2. that the patent was granted on the application of a person not entitled under the provisions of this Act to apply therefor:


3. that the patent was obtained wrongfully in contravention of the rights of the petitioner or any person under or through whom he claims;


4. that the subject of any claim of the complete specification is not an invention within the meaning of this Act;


5. that the invention so far as claimed in any claim of the complete specification is not new, having regard to what was publicly known or publicly used in India before the priority date of the claim or to what was published in India or elsewhere in any of the documents referred to in section 13;


6. that the invention so far as claimed in any claim of the complete specification is obvious or does not involve any inventive step, having regard to what was publicly known or publicly used in India or what was published in India or elsewhere before the priority date of the claim:


7. that the invention, so far as claimed in any claim of the complete specification, is not useful;


8. that the complete specification does not sufficiently and fairly describe the invention and the method by which it is to be performed, that is to say, that the description of the method or the instructions for the working of the invention as contained in the complete specification are not by themselves sufficient to enable a person in India possessing average skill in, and average knowledge of, the art to which the invention relates, to work the invention, or that it does not disclose the best method of performing it which was known to the applicant for the patent and for which he was entitled to claim protection;


9. that the scope of any claim of the complete specification is not sufficiently and clearly defined or that any claim of the complete specification is not fairly based on the matter disclosed in the specification;


10. that the patent was obtained on a false suggestion or representation;


11. that the subject of any claim of the complete specification is not patentable under this Act;


12. that the invention so far as claimed in any claim of the complete specification was secretly used in India, otherwise than as mentioned in sub-section (3), before the priority date of the claim;


13. that the applicant for the patent has failed to disclose to the Controller the information required by section 8 or has furnished information which in any material particular was false to his knowledge;


14. that the applicant contravened any direction for secrecy passed under section 35(***) or made or caused to be made an application for the grant of a patent outside India in contravention of section 39;


15. that leave to amend the complete specification under section 57 or section 58 was obtained by fraud.


16. that the complete specification does not disclose or wrongly mentions the source or geographical origin of biological material used for the invention;


17. that the invention so far as claimed in any claim of the complete specification was anticipated having regard to the knowledge, oral or otherwise, available within any local or indigenous community in India or elsewhere.