India has a very vast and diverse fashion industry which is worth so much money. However, piracy and plagiarism of design is growing concern for the Indian market. As designers and fashion houses are not educated about these laws that are there to protect their artistry work. The Designs Act, 2000, the Trademark Act of 1999, and the Copyright Act of 1957, together, these laws form the triad of protection for the fashion industry, ensuring that the brand identity and artistic aspects of fashion are well-guarded. The fashion houses can use either one or all of these laws to safeguard their bran and designs.
The Legal Protection under: Designs, Trademarks, and Copyrights
The Designs Act, 2000, is specifically designed to protect the visual design of products, focusing on the aesthetic appeal. This includes the shape, configuration, pattern, decorative elements, or composition and mixing of patterns or colours applied to any article/object, making it exclusive to the artist or designer for a period of up to 10 years and is extendable up to 5 more years under section 11 of the Act. In case of piracy of a design that is registered is prohibited under section 22 of the Act. While the Trade Marks Act, 1999, plays a major role in protecting brand names, logos, labels and any other symbols that distinguish the goods or services of one entity from those of others. For fashion houses, trademarks safeguard the brand identity, an essential aspect of their business strategy, providing protection as long as the trademark is in use and duly renewed in time. Furthermore, the Copyright Act, 1957, secure the protection of the artistic aspects of fashion items, such as graphic designs, prints, and even photography of fashion products. But the copyright act restricts the production quantities of the design by 50 units. The moment any fashion article exceeds the limit of 50 units, the copyright would stop subsisting. The Copyright Act makes it apparent that design registration and copyright over an article cannot co-exist. Other than this Geographical Indication Act protects the work of handcrafted fabric and material used to create a design or pattern used by people of a particular region. Additionally if the designer’s work is novel and innovative it is eligible for being patented under the Patent’s Act, 1970.
Challenges faced by the Fashion houses and Designers:
Despite the all the legal framework to protect the design and artistry work of artist and designer, fashion houses in India can still face challenges like:
1. Disputes, over design infringement, trademark violations and copyright infringements are not common but financially draining and time consuming diverting valuable resources away from creative endeavours.
2. The fashion industry moves at a pace often surpassing the speed of legal processes involved in registration. By the time a design is legally protected the trend may have already evolved or gone, rendering the protection less to no relevance.
3. In the world of fashion where inspiration is often drawn from a range of styles proving the originality of a design or the distinctiveness of a trademark can pose challenges. As there is a very thin line between taking inspiration from someone’s work and blatantly copying their design.
4. Since these IP protections are territorial, fashion houses and designers seeking global protection must go through the complex process of securing their intellectual property rights in multiple nations, which is both costly and time-consuming.
5. The digital advancement has enforcement issues for fashion houses due, to online sales of counterfeit goods. This makes it increasingly difficult to monitor and control infringement of their rights.
How to overcome these obstacles
For fashion houses in India, the way of securing and enforcing their rights is multi-dimensional. It involves a strategic approach to intellectual property, combining design registrations, trademark registrations, and copyrights and any other law, tailored according to their artistry work. Continuous and through monitoring of the other competitors, legal action against infringements is also important in keeping the design protected. In the case of Cristian Louboutin who were selling shoes with the “RED SOLE” is a signature and unique to their brand but the defendant copied the Louboutin’s red sole and just made some cosmetic changes for selling their shoes. Court granted permanent injunction in favour of the Plaintiff. This is a great example on why a design needs to protected, and designers/fashion houses needs to be more aware of their rights and remedies available for them.
CONCLUSION
The fashion industry produces many high value products, it is important to protect them against any possible infringement or losses. For that they needs to seek protection under the IPR laws that will provide them with the protection they require. In today’s world designers and fashion houses needs be educated and aware about the IP Laws to protect their design and artistry work. Many of the famous fashion houses like, SABYASACHI has already protected their brand name under trademarks act.
DUCTUS EDGE 