The government is taking steps to further streamline the patent examination process at the Intellectual Property Office in order to bring it at par with the standards of US and UK by ensuring that the pendency of cases does not exceed three months.

This information was shared by Amitabh Kant, Secretary, DIPP, recently while conferring the awards, during the 2nd International Conference on IP Laws & Enforcement of IPR. Kant mentioned that in case of trademarks it will be ensured that there is no pendency of cases. He informed that these changes can be expected within the next 18 months and steps are being taken on a war footing to recruit 1000 examiners and outsource work to institutions such as IITs.

Kant expressed concern over the low levels of domestic filings in patents as well as commercialization. Recognizing the need to scale up the process of IP creation and commercialization of technology, the Government of India embarked on the process of preparing the National IPR Policy that can guide India towards becoming an innovative economy in the next 10 years.

He informed that the IPR Policy has already been circulated to ministries to receive their comments on the subject after which the policy would be sent to the cabinet for approval.

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