Dabur India Limited Vs Ashok Kumar

Dabur India Limited filed a suit against Ashok Kumar and others for trademark infringement, copyright violation, passing off, and unfair competition involving its well-known mark "DABUR", where unknown defendants registered fraudulent domain names like daburdistributorships.in and daburdistributor.com to deceive the public by offering fake jobs, dealerships, and products, collecting money via misleading websites mimicking the plaintiff's content and logos, with incomplete WHOIS data hindering identification. This case was part of a batch of matters addressing systemic cyber frauds through infringing domain names, involving domain name registrars (DNRs), registries, ICANN, banks, telecom providers, and government ministries, with proceedings spanning multiple hearings from 2022 to 2025, including interim injunctions granted ex-parte on March 3, 2022, extended to additional domains, and responses from stakeholders like ICANN, GoDaddy, and MeitY. The court reasoned that domain names form the online identity of businesses requiring protection against misuse for fraud, analyzed DNRs' obligations under ICANN agreements for verification and disclosure, privacy vs. legitimate interest under DPDP Act, banks' role in preventing mismatches via beneficiary name lookup, and intermediaries' due diligence for safe harbor, finding current systems insufficient leading to large-scale deception, thus necessitating stringent measures against non-compliant DNRs including loss of safe harbor and potential blocking. The court granted permanent injunction against the impugned domains, issued dynamic+ injunctions for similar future variations, directed DNRs to implement KYC verification, disclose registrant data within 72 hours, appoint Indian grievance officers, and cease default privacy protection, mandated government consultations for frameworks like NIXI's, required banks to enable beneficiary name lookup and follow SOPs for LEA cooperation, and listed the suit for further proceedings on January 28, 2026.

• Domain Name Registrars (DNRs) and Registry Operators must not offer privacy protection by default but only as a paid opt-in service, and shall disclose registrant details including name, contacts, addresses, and payment info to legitimate requesters, LEAs, or courts within 72 hours under Intermediary Guidelines 2021 [Dabur India Limited v. Ashok Kumar and Ors., CS (COMM) 135/2022, Para 275(A)(i)-(ii)].
• Infringing domain names restrained by court order shall be permanently blocked from re-registration and not placed in common pools, with registries ensuring uniform implementation across DNRs [Dabur India Limited v. Ashok Kumar and Ors., CS (COMM) 135/2022, Para 275(A)(iii)].
• For well-known, invented, arbitrary, or fanciful marks with reputation in India, courts may issue injunctions against infringing domain names with different extensions or alphanumeric variations, which DNRs must enforce without promoting alternatives, risking loss of safe harbor under Section 79 IT Act [Dabur India Limited v. Ashok Kumar and Ors., CS (COMM) 135/2022, Para 275(A)(iv)-(v)].
• DNRs offering services in India must appoint Grievance Officers within one month, with email service on them sufficient for court orders; non-compliance may lead to blocking under Section 69A IT Act [Dabur India Limited v. Ashok Kumar and Ors., CS (COMM) 135/2022, Para 275(A)(ix)-(xi)].
• All DNRs must verify registrant details via e-KYC as per CERT-In circular dated April 28, 2022, and provide data to NIXI monthly if under its registry [Dabur India Limited v. Ashok Kumar and Ors., CS (COMM) 135/2022, Para 275(A)(xiii)-(xiv)].
• Government (MeitY, MHA) shall consult stakeholders for a NIXI-like framework for all DNRs, consider a nodal data repository, and block non-compliant entities; coordinate with ICANN for TMCH access; CGPDTM to publish well-known marks with authentic websites [Dabur India Limited v. Ashok Kumar and Ors., CS (COMM) 135/2022, Para 275(B)(xv)-(xvi)].
• Dynamic+ injunctions apply to identical marks, prefixes/suffixes causing confusion, or alphanumeric variations, with legitimate registrants able to seek court relief [Dabur India Limited v. Ashok Kumar and Ors., CS (COMM) 135/2022, Para 275(C)(xvii)].
• Banks must implement Beneficiary Bank Account Name Lookup per RBI circular December 30, 2024, and follow CEIB SOP dated May 31, 2024 for LEA requests [Dabur India Limited v. Ashok Kumar and Ors., CS (COMM) 135/2022, Para 275(D)(xviii)-(xix)].

Case Title: Dabur India Limited Vs Ashok Kumar and Ors Order date: 24th December, 2025 Case Number: CS (COMM) 135/2022 Neutral Citation: Not Available Name of court: High Court of Delhi at New Delhi Name of Judge: Prathiba M. Singh

[Readers are advised not to treat this as substitute for legal advise as it may contain errors in perception, interpretation, and presentation] [Written By: Advocate Ajay Amitabh Suman, IP Adjutor [Patent and Trademark Attorney], High Court of Delhi]