HC bars infringement of Naukri.Com trademark by Noida firm

The Delhi High Court has barred a Noida-based job portal from using the trademarks 'Naukri' and 'Naukri.Com' belonging to Info Edge (India) Limited which runs an online recruitment classified and related services for job seekers and corporate customers.
A bench of Justice A K Pathak in its May 16 ex-parte order said that Info Edge has made out a prima facie case that it will suffer irreparable loss and injury if CV Naukri and its officials are not restrained from using the trademarks having the term 'naukri' or any deceptively similar word.
"I have heard the counsel for the plaintiff and am of the view that plaintiff has succeeded in disclosing a prima facie case in its favour. In case defendants (CV Naukri and its officials) are not restrained from using the plaintiff's trade mark 'naukri', the plaintiff shall suffer irreparable loss and injury, inasmuch as, balance of convenience is also in favour of the plaintiff.

"Accordingly, till further orders, defendants are restrained from using trade mark and domain name containing word 'naukri' and/or 'naukri.Com' or any other deceptively similar trade mark or domain name as that of plaintiff," the judge said.
The court also appointed two local commissioners to visit the offices of CV Naukri, make an inventory of the infringing materials and then "seize the same contained in computers systems, laptops, CPUs, hard disks and/or CDs, DVDs or any other storage media".
"If any resistance is put by the defendants or any other person on their behalf, local commissioners will be entitled to seek police assistance. In case the premises is found locked, local commissioners shall be at liberty to break open the locks," the court said.

Info Edge, which owns several portals including well known sites like 'Naukri.Com' and 'Jeevansathi.Com', had said in its plea that it has made huge investments in providing the online recruitment classifieds and related services to job seekers as well as recruiters and over the years has acquired a huge reputation and goodwill in the market.
It had alleged that in order to encash its goodwill and reputation, CV Naukri and its officials, Akashdeep, Pradeep Narwal and Ashish Mittal, had adopted the trade marks - 'cvnaukri.Com' and 'resumenaukri.Com', which are deceptively similar to Info Edge's domain names.
Info Edge had also alleged that CV Naukri and its officials had defrauded several job seekers and added that it had also lodged a complaint with the Cyber Cell of Uttar Pradesh Police.