City’s famed baker, confectioner move to protect their trademarks

Bengaluru: A couple of iconic traditional businesses that have been synonymous with Bengaluru for decades have swung into action to protect their trademarks. This is in the wake of complaints that fraudsters were capitalising on their brand value and flooding the market with fake versions of their products, which were also of substandard quality.

Six-decade-old OG Variar & Sons Bakery and five-decade-old Kanti Sweets have issued caution notices that any attempt at deceptively using their trademarks would be deemed as encroachment of their rights and those responsible would be liable to face civil and criminal action.

OG Variar & Sons Bakery has been operational in Rajajinagar since 1955, while Kanti Sweets, a confectioner, has 65 outlets across the state.

The baker has registered OG Variar & Sons Variar Bakery as it trademark under the Trademarks Act, 1999. Claiming that the trademark has attained immense reputation and valuable goodwill, the caution notice says that certain instances of deceptive and imitative use of the same have come to the firm’s notice.

When customers complained about fraud

Vijaya Shankar OG, owner of OG Variar & Sons Bakery, said that in recent years they have received lot of complaints about people maligning their brand and sending a wrong message to their customers. “In one case, someone had opened O Variar Bakery pretending to be from our stable and selling products closely identified with us. Customers complained to us about this fraud and demanded we act against it. Brands and trademarks have gained a lot of importance over the last few years, prompting us to register the trademark,” he added.

Srinath Srinivasan of LR Swami Co, which represents OG Variar & Sons Bakery, said that businessmen have lately realised that trademark or brand is an intellectual property of the establishment and it can be sold like any other property. They have realised that it has lot of money.

“Even if someone has impersonated or tried to confuse customers by using a part of the logo or trademark they will be held responsible. Enforcement has been better in terms of intellectual property rights (IPR) and courts have considered it to be an offence of serious nature,” he added.

Kanti Sweets has registered four trademarks/trading styles as its property, which it claims to be using for several decades with respect to its “sweets, savouries and bakery items”. The confectioner’s warning notice says that certain unscrupulous persons are using a deceptive version of its trademarks with insignificant cosmetic changes and warned of strict legal action against those misusing its trademarks.

C Venkatasubramaniam of Vitto Patents and Trade Marks, which has issued the notice on behalf of Kanti Sweets, said intellectual property rights have, of late, been gaining importance in India. “Vijay Mallya pledging 13 trademarks (brand names) for a huge sum made many business establishments realise there is a good amount of money in trademarks. We have issued notices to individuals who have impersonated trademarks,” he added.

Waking up to brand power

Harish V, a former partner in the consultancy firm Grant Thornton, said in general every entrepreneur has realised the value of brand that can generate business and this is what is getting them to protect it. They may also be making efforts to raise capital from private equity using their brand value. “Everyone is waking up to the power and value of brand,” he added.