Toyota v. Prius Auto Industries: the Supreme Court anchors trans-border reputation in territoriality
On 14 December 2017 a two-judge bench of the Supreme Court, in Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha v. M/S Prius Auto Industries Ltd, affirmed the Delhi High Court Division Bench's reversal of an ad-interim injunction in favour of Toyota and dismissed Toyota's appeal. The judgment, authored by Justice Ranjan Gogoi for himself and Justice Navin Sinha, holds that trans-border reputation under Indian passing-off law is governed by the territoriality principle — a foreign mark must demonstrate substantial spillover goodwill in Indian territory at the relevant date, here April 2001, and the classical trinity of goodwill, misrepresentation and damage applies even where the mark is globally famous. The judgment reads down Whirlpool (1996) and Milmet Oftho (2004) without overruling them and aligns Indian law with the English Starbucks (HK) approach. A close reading of the judgment's procedural posture, the territoriality holding, and what practitioners should plead in trans-border reputation suits.