The Government of India recently introduced the Tribunal Reforms (Rationalization and Conditions of service) Bill, 2021 which was passed by Lok Sabha (The Lower house) and is currently pending at Rajya Sabha (The Upper House) for its approval. The Bill was introduced to bring reforms in working and appeals through Tribunals. The bill aims to modify the working of some tribunals or merging some which are involved in similar functions while scrapping other tribunal all together which are not necessary or which do not handle cases in which public at large is litigant.
REASON OF THE BILL
The decision to reform tribunals was taken after the government’s analysis of tribunals’ data for last three years. It was noted that tribunals in several sectors did not necessarily lead to faster justice delivery and that they were also at a considerable expense to the exchequer. Another reason which led to such reforms was the issue of shortage of supporting staff of tribunals and infrastructure which led to inefficiency in working of such tribunal. The government also relied on various Supreme Court Judgement wherein the Hon’ble Court has deprecated the practice of tribunalisation of justice and filling of appeals directly to the Supreme court. The Government further while considering streamlining of tribunals necessary noted that it would not only save considerable expense to the exchequer and at the same time, lead to speedy delivery of justice.
SHORTCOMINGS OF IPAB AND ITS SCRAPPING
The dispute resolution of IP matters is a long process. An additional Intellectual Property Appellate Board (IPAB) was constituted in 2003 to look into appeals from Registrar under The Patents Act, 1970, Trade Marks Act, 1999, Geographical Indication of Goods Act, 1999 & the Copyright Act, 1957 (the Acts) and to have an expert insight in such matters. However, the Board failed to achieve its objective and proved ineffective. The Backlog of IP cases instead of falling, increased even after constituting the board. A total of 3933 cases were pending with the board till 2019. and a total of 1223 cases are still pending out of 1541 cases which were filled between August 2020 to February 2021. Considering the inefficiency of IPAB in delivering justice and in reducing significant workload from high courts which otherwise would have adjudicated such cases, the Bill proposes to scrap the Intellectual property Appellate Board in its entirety and replace it with respective High Courts. This was done with an aim to reduce Backlog of IP matter through speedy trial and to relocate the funds earlier utilized on the Appellate Board and its infrastructure. Another reason which led to scrapping of IPAB was that IPAB acted just as an additional layer of litigation and many cases did not achieve finality at the level of IPAB and were litigated further till High Courts and Supreme Court, especially those with significant implications.
AMENDMENTS IN THE ACT
The Bill further proposes to transfer all the pending cases of IPAB to High Courts. Accordingly, the Bill has amended the term Appellate Tribunal with High Court in all relevant sections of the Acts. The bill has also repealed certain sections which specifically dealt with Appellate tribunal. However, more clarity is required for the cases which have been already once heard by IPAB or in cases where final decision of IPAB is still pending. Further, it will be interesting to see how effectively does the transfer of cases takes place from IPAB to High Court in absence of any specific guideline or procedure laid down.
APPEALS
The Bill provides for appeal against the order of registrar directly to the High Court within 3 months from date of order. Such appeal shall be listed and heard by single judge of the High court, which if deems fit can transfer it to the bench. In case, the appeal is decided by the single judge, a further appeal lies with the bench of High court within 3 months from date of certified copy of judgement. The jurisdiction of High Courts in Appeals of IP Matter is still unclear, whether only high courts at the place of sitting of Registrar is will have the jurisdiction or whether the civil procedural law will be followed while hearing such matter. It will also be interesting to see if a separate IP bench is created in High Courts to deal with IP issues as already pending cases in High courts have increased over years and the bill if implemented will further overburden the court.
CONCLUSION
The bill is a step towards bringing appeals of judicial cases in main streamline. The Bill still has certain open ends which needs to be looked and filled in order to effectively implement it. The Government needs to look into management of these cases in High court which are already over burdened. The Government also needs to fill the vacancies of Judges in High Courts for achieving the aim of the Bill.