DCSL’s interim injunction refused

By Telles Anandappa

The High Court of Colombo refused an interim injunction filed by a distilleries company against another manufacturer from selling its products which resemble the bottles and labels manufactured by the petitioner.

The petitioner Distilleries Company of Sri Lanka Limited (DCSL) said the defendant company Messrs Scotland Distilleries and Blenders (Pvt) Ltd. was manufacturing and marketing arrack in bottles with a label similar to that of DCSL.

DCSL said the public would get confused or misled over the products of Scotland Distilleries thinking they were those of DCSL, on seeing the mark used by the rival company.

DCSL said the rival company was using similar bottles and labels with the purpose of confusing the public causing prejudice to the petitioner.

The defendant Scotand Distilleries said though the shape of the bottles and the way the labels were pasted was almost similar, the colours on the background of the two labels were of two different colours, namely yellow and brown.

It was also said that the logos of the two labels have quite different features in its shape and colour, style, font and letters.
The letters ‘DCSL’ appear on the logo of the petitioner and the letters ‘SCOTLAND’ appear clearly on the logo of the defendant.
Therefore, it was claimed the consumer would not get confused.

Petitioner’s counel said the words ‘extra special’ found on both labels were written in a similar manner and therby the consumer could get confused.The defendant said exclusive rights could not be reserved to any particular person as thay were genetic words found in the dictionary.

High Court Judge K.T.Chitrasiri was of the view that the public would not get confused or misled by looking at the defendent’s products.In the event the court issues an interim injunction in favour of the petitioner the defendant would have to withdraw all the products which had the label in question from the market, causing a substantial loss to the company.On the other hand the petitioner may not suffer such a substantial loss if the defendant was allowed to market its products.

Therefore the Court refused to issue the interim injunction as prayed for by the petitioner. Attorney P. Nagendran P.C with Buddika Jayasinghe instructed byDulip Jayamaha appeared for the defendant.

S.Parthalingam P.C. with V.K.Choksy instructed by Miss S.V. Senarathna appeared for the plaintiff.