The Controller General of Patents, Designs and Trademarks (CGPDTM) has invited final comments and suggestions from the stakeholders and others on “Revised draft guidelines for examination of patent applications in the field of pharmaceuticals”.  The stakeholders have to send their comments latest by October 16, 2014 by e-mail.

Earlier on August 12, 2014, the patent office had issued the 'Revised draft guidelines for examination of patent applications in the field of pharmaceuticals' and had invited the stakeholders’ comments and suggestions. Several national and international experts and organisations had submitted their suggestions and comments on this draft guidelines.

To discuss the issue further a stakeholders’ meet was held on October 7, 2014 in Mumbai which was chaired by the CGPDTM Chaitanya Prasad.

The patent office made a presentation based on the summarised comments as received from various stakeholders highlighting the various important points to be discussed. The meeting was attended by the patent agents, representatives of pharmaceutical companies, Indian as well as international.

After long deliberations, final comments/suggestions were invited from the stakeholders latest by 16th October 2014 by e-mail (a.chakaraborti@nic.in). These guidelines are supplemental to the practices and procedures followed by the patent office as published in the ‘Manual of Patent Office Practice and Procedure’, “Guidelines For Examination of Biotechnology Applications” and the “Guidelines For Processing of Patent Applications Relating to Traditional Knowledge and Biological Material”.

The present guidelines are prepared with the objective that the Guidelines will help the Examiners and the Controllers of the Patent Office in achieving consistently uniform standards of patent examination and grant. In case of any conflict between these Guidelines and the Patents Act, 1970 and the Rules made there under, the provisions of the Act and Rules will prevail.