The Madhya Pradesh High Court on Thursday stated that the consumers of scotch whisky are educated and belong to an effluent class of society and can distinguish between the bottles of two different brands. The court had made the observation while rejecting Pernod Ricard’s appeal to stop Indore-based JK Industries from producing whisky under the label of ‘London Pride’.

 Ricard had primarily asked the court to put an injunction against JK Industries, claiming that they have violated the ‘Blenders Pride’ trademark and have copied the appearance of the ‘Imperial Blue’ bottle. The division bench comprising Justice Sushrut Arvind Dharmadhikari and Justice Pranay Verma said that the products of the two brands include premium or ultra-premium whisky, whose consumers are ‘educated and discerning type’.

“It can be safely presumed with a sufficient deal of certainty that the consumers of such products would be mostly literate and having reasonable intelligence to distinguish between the bottles of Blenders Pride/Imperial Blue and that of London Pride,” the bench added.

Ricards had also claimed that JK Industries was putting its whisky by using a label and overall packaging that was very similar to that of ‘Imperial Blue’. The court while comparing the bottles of both the companies said that the defendant’s mark cannot be said to be deceptively similar to that of Ricards.

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The bench said, “Examining the marks of plaintiffs with the mark of defendant as a whole, neither there is any visual nor phonetic nor structural similarity between any of the boxes or bottles of the plaintiffs with that of the boxes or bottles of the defendant." The court also noted that Pernod Ricard does not possess any registration in respect to the colours and design used in ‘Imperial Blue’. The court also said that the word ‘pride’ cannot cause any misconception or misapprehension in the minds of the consumer. The High Court also found no error in the Trial Court’s observation.

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