Doctrine of Equivalents in India: Beyond the “Essential Elements”

To conform to the TRIPS Agreement, The Indian Patents Act 1975 has been amended several times to comply with the global requirements. However, there is no clear directive in the statutes of the law as well as in the subsequent Court opinions regarding the analysis of the infringement by equivalence factor. In Raj Parkash v Mangat Ram Chowdhry, 1977 the Court provided the analysis of “Pith and Marrow” in line of the British analysis. Thereafter in the new regime of the patent law provides in Sotefin SA v Indraprastha Cancer Society, 2022 case the analysis of essential elements again. Now the Court has come across the question of equivalence in case of the chemical invention, i.e., in the alleged infringement by Natco, India for the preparation of the agrochemical Chlorantraniliprole or CTPR and thereby infringing the Indian Patent 298645 owned by FMC Corporation, Singapore. The Court applies the doctrine of equivalents to ascertain if there is an act of infringement to FMC’s patent by analyzing the case beyond the essential elements of a claim and set forth a new method of determination where the previous cases had fallen short of.