Thirteen leading domestic companies constituting the Indian Pharmaceutical Alliance (IPA) are planning to oppose frivolous patents that have been granted by and are reaching the Indian Patent Office. According to reported estimates, on an average, about 25 frivolous applications are filed in the Patent Office every month. The alliance has recently been reported to have asked the Controller General of Patents to review 86 patents - 81 from foreign companies and five from Indian firms, including an IPA member.

These patents do not meet the standards of the Indian Patents Act 1970, as regards Section 3(d), that does not allow patents for frivolous modifications, vide disallowing new forms of known substances and combination of known substances, and shall be challenged by the alliance. The IPA has iterated that many patents have been granted on frivolous modifications even without a claim by the applicant of significant enhancement in efficacy, or where such claims have been made, without due verification by the Patent Office. It has also called for modifications in patent guidelines to include more meaningful disclosures in the abstracts, so that inventions can be easily identified. The guidelines need to have a deterrent to filing “undeserving applications” and grant of improper patents so as to restore the confidence of the stakeholders in the working of the Patent Office.

The IPA has complied a list of these undeserving patents, which was made public by the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion. Challenge to these patents would be launched at the four Patent offices at the pre-grant stage itself, the post-grant stage being time consuming and even more expensive. The IPA spends a huge chunk on research every year, accounting to about 90% of the total private sector expenditure on drug research. It is planning to set up a dedicated team of experts to fight all such applications to prevent them from being granted. The first set of pre-grant oppositions is reported to be leveled against the applications made in October 2009 by both domestic and foreign applicants.

The Controller General of Patents has said that at present, there is no provision to review the patents already granted by the Patent Office once the post-grant opposition period (one year after the grant) is over, but they can be revoked by moving the Intellectual Property Appellate Board or Courts against the wrongly granted patents.

The public interest in affording medicines to all sections of society gets negated by granting patent protection to these frivolous drugs, as has been expressed by a stakeholder. Till now, the oppositions to such patents were leveled by either individual generic companies or by NGOs. These patents were granted in the first four years of the patents regime that took effect in 2005.