Delhi HC refuses to strike out a 'CAMEL' copyright: a claimant must prove it is the first owner of the work

The Delhi High Court dismissed a petition by Japan Tobacco Inc. and an affiliate seeking removal of a 1997 registered copyright in a 'CAMEL' artistic work from the Register of Copyrights under Section 50 of the Copyright Act, 1957. The petitioners said their predecessor conceived the camel artwork in 1913, that the respondent's work, claimed as first published in 1992, was copied from theirs, and that Section 40 of the Act and the International Copyright Order, 1999 protect such foreign works in India. Justice Tushar Rao Gedela accepted that those provisions extend copyright across borders, but held that they do not avoid the first question: whoever claims copyright in an original artistic work must establish as a fact that they are its "first owner" under Section 17, which contains no deeming fiction. A trade mark registration may lend some credibility but is not enough.

The petitioners relied only on pages from books about the brand, which the respondent had denied and which were not proved in accordance with law. Under Sections 101 to 106 of the Evidence Act, the Court said, the burden shifts only after the party bearing the initial onus discharges it, and Section 48 of the Copyright Act raises a presumption in favour of the registered respondent. Statements in a separate trade mark suit were not clear admissions, and the Court did not decide that suit. This is a Delhi High Court ruling, binding within Delhi, not a Supreme Court precedent.