Assessment of Inventive Step in India
Though writing should be a regular affair when it comes to blogging but professional commitments intertwined with family responsibilities do not really leave much room to do so! What sparked this blog was the conundrum surrounding the Computer Related Inventions (CRIs) and their patentability in India in light of Section 3(k) of the Patents Act, 1970. In December 2019, the Delhi High Court in Ferid Allani vs. Union of India (2019 SCC Online Del 11876) examined the rejection of a patent by the Intellectual Property Appellate Board (IPAB) to a CRI and held that most inventions of the present era make use of computer programs and therefore, it would be discriminatory to reject a patent application to such inventions for merely making use of computer programs in its functioning. The Court further held that a patent application is to be evaluated with respect to its technical contribution. However, the Court did not elucidate a definition of what can be construed as an invention exhibiting