Siddhi Vinayak Knots & Prints Pvt. Ltd. v. Amazon India 
 In the High Court of Bombay
CS 223/2016
Before Justice G S Patel
Decided on February 01, 2017

Relevancy of the case: Intermediary liability for having knowledge of copyright infringement and not disclosing the aggrieved about the same

Statutes and Provisions Involved

• The Information Technology Act, 2000 (Section 79)

Relevant Facts of the Case

• A third party infringed the plaintiffs’ design and copyright. Intermediaries like Amazon, E-bay, Flipkart, and others knew about the same.
• The plaintiff sent chamber summons to these intermediaries regarding the infringement and alleged that these intermediaries did not provide information regarding the infringement even on appropriate request by the plaintiff.

Opinion of the Bench

• The Court believes that the intermediaries, in the past and in the future, should disclose any such information regarding the plaintiffs’ design and copyright infringement. However, no one can compel them to provide such information overnight as there may be hundreds of others in the position similar to that of the plaintiff. Thus, the court shall allow them time to do so.
• Further, relying on the case Myspace Inc v. Super Cassettes Industries Ltd. and Shreya Singhal v. Union of India, the court observed that the intermediaries cannot simply respond to a notice served by the plaintiff. A case must be made out for the grant of relief, which in the present case would be difficult to give because the relief which the defendants seek is over-ambitious.

Final Decision

• The court directed to file Fresh chamber summonses on February 22, 2017.

This case summary has been prepared by Anushka Ojha, an undergraduate student at Bharati Vidyapeeth New Law College, Pune, during her internship with The Cyber Blog India in May/June 2021.