The Delhi High Court has issued an interim injunction restraining fifteen entities from using trade names deceptively similar to the trademark of Domino’s Pizza or its earlier brand, Dominick’s Pizza. Justice Saurabh Banerjee, who passed the order, underscored the heightened standard required in cases involving food products due to their direct impact on public health.
“In essence, any confusion between such products, if allowed to continue, can lead to disastrous consequences on human health. Therefore, this Court has to adopt a more cautious and stringent approach for judging the likelihood of confusion and to exercise greater care,” the Court observed.
The suit was filed by Jubilant FoodWorks Limited, which operates the Domino’s franchise in India, along with Domino’s Pizza LLC, the U.S.-based parent company founded in 1960. The plaintiffs claimed infringement of their marks “Domino’s” and “Dominick’s” by entities using names such as “Domnic’s”, “Dominic”, “Domnik”, “Daminic”, and “Daminic’s”.
After reviewing the pleadings, the High Court observed that the marks adopted by the defendants were deceptively similar to the plaintiffs’ earlier trademark “Dominick’s Pizza”. It held that “the defendants have either wholly copied the plaintiffs’ mark or have just removed the letter ‘K’ from the plaintiffs’ mark ‘Dominick’, and have minor alterations such as addition or subtraction of the letter ‘i’, or ‘s’, or replacement of the letter ‘o’ with ‘a’, so as to come close to plaintiffs’ trademarks and ride on their goodwill.”
The Court also directed food delivery platforms Swiggy and Zomato to delist or suspend the listed respondents from their services. Summons have been issued in the main suit, and the matter will proceed further.
