Friday 15 November 2013

Which Media Channel is Right in Andhra Pradesh
I am not given for Tweets and blogs in the due course of maintaining social networks. Rather, I maintain consistent reticence in other social networking sites like Face Book which I have been using to share my photos and fun stuff though. I have enjoyed an academic sojourn for a month and started killing time by reading as many News papers as possible and astonished to reckon that papers have stopped giving news and extending their tentacles to bolster the politicians of their own franchise. Then, I have started scrolling the TV news channels which have travelled far ahead of news papers in bristling the concealed emotions like caste, region, religion and what not.  So, I thought of using Social Network sites to blow out my feelings and to caution my young students whose vulnerable sentiments are culminated by the selfish entrepreneurs running the media houses. Social network is perhaps rational to an extent, that it does not have editors to curtail my writings nor filters the replies I receive.
Friends, gone are the days when media was approbated with the status of a Fourth Estate and now very much replicating a Fifth Column that undermines the eventual benefits sought by the society. One of the media houses being run in one particular region has been imposing a depreciatory stereotype on another region and trying its level best to widen the rifts existing among the people. Another media house has been granting Yellow confetti showers only and only on one political party right from its incarnation what so ever is the reason. An another media house has tried to make mountains out of molehills by telecasting the pornographic videos in the name of scandals and completely overshot the doctrine of private life behind the veils of TRP ratings. These unscrupulous papers and channels have initiated a new business of converting opinions into news and requirements of sponsored politicians into investigative journalism. So, my dear young students, beware of the analysis and reports generated by the media. I do not advocate you not read news papers or not to watch news channels. But use them only to procure information or news and try to understand the nuance of the analysis and reports which are biased and vested with ephemeral gratifications of few media entrepreneurs.

Tuesday 15 January 2013


        My brief address to the participants in National seminar on food security in India.
Honorable  district Collector sri Girija Shankar garu, sri Chandra Mouli IAS garu Sri Suryanarayana Reddy garu from APARD, distinguished professors, guests and all other participants,  very good morning to you all. Today, I take pride inviting you to our college on this august occasion of conducting a national seminar on the Food Security and Inclusive Growth in Rural India. Friends, we are all conversant with the necessity of providing food security to vulnerable sections of the society and also conversant with the consequences of food insecurity in the developing countries like India, where more than 60 % of the population represents the rural arcades with very delicate livelihood sources.  Natural calamities, monsoon failures and such other whirlpools are often causing dreadful dark clouds on the social surface of the country and making people aggrieved of food insecurity and dignified life style. This condition will not only undermine the planned objectives of the state but also deters the caliber of human capital in the form of malnourishment and infant mortality. No doubt, Government has been mooting seamless programmes to ensure food security and inclusive growth in spite of which, there are grim and alarming statistics pertaining to food security. So it is obvious that, something is still going wrong somewhere. So, I call all the participants to make use of this national seminar to tender their advocacy in the direction of re animating the policy frame work. I will feel extremely happy if this seminar succeeds in questioning the fundamentals and contribute something novel to the body of food security and inclusive growth programmes of this country. At the outset, I congratulate all the resources persons and the staff members who came ahead to make this seminar a successful event. Thank you very much and be comfortable at our college. 

Sunday 30 December 2012

notes on Trade Mark Protection in India


What is a trade mark
Trade mark can be defined as the formal recognition of the brand of a product or service which distinguishes one manufacturer from others and accords uniqueness to the goods and services.
Origin of the trade marks
The process of assigning names and emblems on the products has been a practice long in use. For example Indus Valley Civilization reveals that the manufacturers were induced to affix symbols to their goods or cargo to identify the origin and to levy the tax thereon. This practice continued to keep its sway even in the age of industrial revolution and unleashed the concept of trademark protection.
Features of trademark
·         It is an intellectual property right of the manufacturer
·         It can be registered
·         It is protected from the infringement through separate act
Need for protecting trademarks
·         Unscrupulous traders often deceive the customers by dumping the counterfeit goods and deceptive packeges of well known products.
·         Trademark infringement depreciates the brand image of genuine manufacturers.
·         Global competition in trade made it obligatory to globalize the brands and to insulate them from external infringement
Development of  the Trademark protection law in India
The British Common Law has sown the seeds of trademarks protection in India which has been conglomerated into Trade and Merchandise Marks act 1957. This law was criticized to be too nationalistic and ignored the interests of foreign trademarks. Ultimately, India being the founder member of WTO was left with no option but to change its law in order to meet the requirements of TRIPs. Therefore the erstwhile act 1957 has been replaced with Trademarks act 1999, which has become operational only from the year 2003.
Important features of Trademarks act 1999
·         Indian government has established the office of the registrar of Trademarks at Mumbai with zonal offices at Ahmadabad, Bangalore, Chennai and Kolkatha to enable the process of registration of trademarks
·         Surnames, laudatory words and descriptive words are not allowed to be registered as the trademarks. However the surname which is completely unique and prefixed with other words can be registered as the trade mark.
·         The words and emblems reserved for the disposal of government under the names and emblems ( prevention of improper use ) act 1951 cannot be registered as the trademarks
·         The tenure of protecting the registered trademark has been extended from seven years to ten years
·         Foreign trademarks were also allowed to be registered in Indian jurisdiction.
·         Well known trademarks are protected within the ambit of Indian frontiers irrespective of its registration. 
·         Service providers like Bankers, education institutions and Insurance entities are also allowed to obtain trademarks, which were not available in the earlier act.
·         Specific certificates missed by the manufacturer or service provider are also eligible for trademark.
·         All the goods and services are classified into 34 classes, such that, the similar goods of dissimilar classes can not have uniform trademark.
·         It is possible to have collective trademark for different goods, if , they are manufactured by a single entity or person.
·         The definition of trademark has been enhanced to include the brand name, package and the tagline.
·         The new law also enables the registration of geographical trademarks
Penalties and punishments for the infringement of trademarks
Any violation of the provisions of the trademarks act 1999 atrats the penalty ranging from Rs 50000 to Rs 200000 or impresinment from 6 moths to 3 years or both.