Financial Times

NIPO to remove MTV logo from register
Maharaja Organisation is continuing to use the letters MTV in its logo, although the authorities are preparing to remove it from the trademarks register following a recent Supreme Court ruling, raising the possibility of Music TV owners Viacom International taking an enjoining order against them.

Mano Wikramanayake, Group Director, Maharaja (Pvt) Ltd., said the MTV logo belongs to the Maharaja Group and has nothing to do with Music Television. "We can use our logo and will keep using it," he said. He further said that it is the state authorities that the Supreme Court has ruled against and not the company, Maharaja (Pvt) Ltd.

Director General, National Intellectual Property Office of Sri Lanka (NIPO), Dr. D.M. Karunaratne said his predecessor had accepted the application tendered by Maharaja to register their logo, without 'exclusive rights' to the letters MTV.

He said NIPO is awaiting an indication from the Attorney General to remove the mark from the logo register. However, he said that since NIPO is not a law enforcement authority, it cannot effectively do anything about Maharaja using the MTV letters. "The owner of the MTV mark has to take action about this," he said, indicating that Viacom will have to sort out the matter legally.

Julius and Creasy, the agents for Viacom in Sri Lanka said that the Supreme Court has not issued a final injunction stopping Maharaja from using the logo, but clearly specified removing it from the register. "But it is implied that they should not use it," a Julius and Creasy source said, adding that Viacom is likely to move for an enjoining order against Maharaja soon.

However, he said that they have not indicated this to Julius and Creasy so far. The source said that Viacom is in a stronger position after 14 years, because of the Supreme Court's ruling. "Maharaja might gradually phase out the letters MTV and focus more on the Channel One logo," he said.

NIPO's decision to register Maharaja's television logo was challenged by Viacom International at the Commercial High Courts, because they had already registered the MTV letters internationally. However, the Commercial High Courts had held with NIPO's decision, prompting Viacom to take it up at the Supreme Court, which ruled against the Commercial High Court judgment, saying that the order of the Commercial High Court judge was filled with irrelevant considerations and without due regard to the law on trade marks.

The Supreme Court verdict said that both Music TV and Maharaja TV marks so strongly resemble one another that the viewers are prone to confusion. They said the Registrar had registered both trademarks with a disclaimer that no party is entitled to exclusive use of the letters MTV.

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