Evolution of Patent law in India

Your phone, your cough syrup and the tractor in your cousin's village all began as somebody's invention, and somebody once asked the State for the exclusive right to sell it. Who gets that right, for how long, and what must the inventor give in return? India has answered those questions differently at different times. A medicine that could not be patented as a product before 2005 can be patented today, and the body that hears patent appeals changed in 2021. To understand today's Patents Act, you need to see how it got here.

In two minutes

Indian patent law moved from the colonial Patents and Designs Act 1911 to the Patents Act 1970, which has since been reshaped by amendments in 2002, 2005 and 2021 (with penalty changes in 2024 and 2026), each responding to international obligations or to court structure.

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