Delhi High Court restrains Amazon from selling Pakistani Rooh Afza on its website

The Delhi High Court on Friday granted relief to Hamdard National Foundation (India), the manufacturer of Rooh Afza and restrained e-commerce platform Amazon from listing any product which infringes Hamdard's trademark ‘ROOHAFZA' [Hamdard National Foundation India & Anr v Amazon India & Anr]..Single-bench of Justice Prathiba M Singh specifically restrained Amazon from selling and offering for sale the products under the mark Rooh Afza manufactured in Pakistan."Considering the submissions made and the facts recorded above, the suit shall stand decreed in terms of paragraph 38(a) of the Plaint (an order for permanent injunction restraining) against Defendant No.2 as also the sellers mentioned above," the Court ordered. .The present suit was filed by Hamdard National Foundation (India) against two companies, Amazon India Limited and Golden Leaf. The suit related to the product and mark of the plaintiff's product ‘ROOH AFZA’.The case of the plaintiffs was that Hamdard Group is engaged in the business of manufacturing and selling various Unani and Ayurvedic medicines, oils, syrups and non-alcoholic beverages including the popular drink Rooh Afza..It was submitted that their history dates back to over 100 years when well-known Unani practitioner ‘Hakeem Hafiz Abdul Majeed’ set up a Unani clinic under the name ‘Hamdard Dawakhana’.The grievance of the plaintiffs in the present case was that defendant No.1- Amazon India, ran the e-commerce website 'www.amazon.in.' on which defendant No.2, Golden Leaf, started selling and offering for sale the product ‘ROOH AFZA’.The petitioners also submitted that upon purchasing the said product, they found to their utter shock and surprise that product was manufactured in Pakistan..Thus, it was submitted that the said product does not comply with the legal requirements of the Legal Metrology Act, 2009, the Legal Metrology Commodities) Rules of 2011 and the Food Safety and Standards Act of 2006 which governs such products..When the matter was heard on September 5, the Court after observing that 'Rooh Afza' is a product which is being consumed by Indian households for over a century now, had directed Amazon and other sellers to remove all listings of a manufacturer who claimed to be 'Rooh Afza' Pakistani counterpart and was selling its products on Amazon India's website.Considering that this could have an adverse impact on the consumers, as the details of the sellers are not known, the Court had on September 5 stated,"Since www.amazon.in claims to be an intermediary it has an obligation to disclose names of sellers, their contact details etc., on the product listings," the high court had observed.Justice Singh had directed the listings of all 'Rooh Afza' products to be removed within 48 hours..When the matter was taken up on November 11, the counsel for Hamdard group submitted that all the infringing listings have been taken down and the reliefs sought in the plaint stand satisfied.The Court proceeded to record the same and decreed the suit in favour of Hamdard.It also directed that in case any other listings infringing the plaintiffs’ mark ‘ROOHAFZA’ are found by the plaintiff, the same shall be brought to the notice of Amazon and the same shall be taken down in accordance with the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021. .Advocate Shivendra Pratap Singh appeared for the Hamdard Group. Meanwhile, advocate Siddharth Chopra appeared for Amazon..[Read Order]