Thread: Indian complainant is awarded .com from WIPO, but owns neither the TM nor .in/.co.in

Code:

http://www.thedomains.com/2011/08/10/bjp-com-a-14-year-old-domain-is-taken-in-a-udrp-without-a-registered-trademark/

The complainant has no TM, is from India and doesn't even own the .in/.co.in - I think this sets a bad precedent.

I agree that this is a bad decision, but don't really think that the BJP needs a trademark - they are extremely well known.

Not really, if you redirect the domain name to the competitor even for a breif while, its called using in bad faith.

Moreover the owners of BJP.COM redirected the site to that of its opponent right about the time the Supreme Court of India came out with a verdict involving these two.

You can't have that, can you ? Besides both the parties involved in the domain name dispute belonged to India, and BJP being a well-known party, the name has to go to BJP.

Originally Posted by Jeff

I agree that this is a bad decision, but don't really think that the BJP needs a trademark - they are extremely well known.

OK, but this a .com, not a .in. The may not need a TM within India, but I'm sure worldwide there are plenty of commercial entities using this acronym (BJP isn't even a commercial entity). Of course the redirection of the domain to another political party was the only thing that gives legitimacy to this decision.

Originally Posted by the_poet

OK, but this a .com, not a .in. The may not need a TM within India, but I'm sure worldwide there are plenty of commercial entities using this acronym (BJP isn't even a commercial entity). Of course the redirection of the domain to another political party was the only thing that gives legitimacy to this decision.

Both parties belonged to India, so imagine if Microsoft operated only in India but did not own Micorsoft.com, infact Microsoft.com was owned by some other Indian firm that redirected to Apple.com when Windows 7 launched. What do you think should be the verdict here?

Originally Posted by Ace

Both parties belonged to India, so imagine if Microsoft operated only in India but did not own Micorsoft.com, infact Microsoft.com was owned by some other Indian firm that redirected to Apple.com when Windows 7 launched. What do you think should be the verdict here?

Microsoft would be a commercial entity and would own a legit TM for their brand, unlike BJP.

Assume both parties had TM for Microsoft, one deals in software and the other in Milk. But the owner of Microsoft.com who deals in Milk, occasionally redirects to Apple.com, but on other time has an under construction page. What do you think now.

The biggest blunder the domain owner has done is redirecting to All india congress website , this leads to a big political fight on national media for hours, I remember the whole day NDTV has put a scroll-er for the same... BJP general secretary accused congress hijacking their identity and IP. Congress general secretary retaliated with strong outburst. Its a huge damage to the BJP and also created a big confusion to the people who doesn't know these dynamics of domaining, I am fully confident the decision is certainly based on this incident and also BJP filed this petition for the same reason.

Interesting, but it's suck decision. I guess now on nothing is secure from your owns domain. Be careful with it.

Originally Posted by GetItNow

Interesting, but it's suck decision. I guess now on nothing is secure from your owns domain. Be careful with it.

The owner of BJP.COM did hanky-panky and got screwed with it. In fact the current owner did not buy BJP.COM in 1997 and hence lied in the affidavit. Read the comments in the link provided esp by Johb Berryhill and you will know why the name got taken.