The appellate court, as a principle, is not justified in interfering with the exercise of discretion under appeal solely on the ground that if it had considered the matter at the trial stage, it would have come to a contrary conclusion. However, in an appeal against the grant of an interim injunction, the Division Bench of the Delhi Court stayed the interim injunction order, finding serious errors in the approach of the Single Judge in claim construction and the infringement analysis based on it.
The interim injunction order of the Single Judge came under the judicial scanner of the Division Bench of the Delhi High Court in an appeal in Automat Irrigation Pvt. Ltd. and Ors vs Aquestia Limited & Anr. [FAO(OS) (COMM) 123/2025], dated January 5, 2026. directed against the judgment of the learned Single Judge, where it was held that the “Fluid Control Valve”, manufactured by the Automat (appellants) and sold under the name “Hydromat Valve”, infringed Indian Patent IN 4270503 of the Aquestia (respondent). The Division Bench found that the impugned judgment of the Single Judge suffered from a basic misunderstanding of the nature of the invention forming the subject matter of the suit patent and the manner in which the product of the appellants was fundamentally different from the subject matter of the suit patent.
The Division Bench questioned the approach of the Single Judge that special consideration is to be assigned to the part of the claim, followed by the words “characterized in that”. According to the Division Bench, such claim construction was not mandated by patent law in India. The Division Bench observed that patent law in India follows a strict statutory regime under the Patents Act, 1970, which does not envisage granting special consideration to any part of the claim or to the complete specification of a patent in the course of its construction or interpretation. The Division Bench held that the Single Judge had wrongly confined the infringement analysis to the portion of Claim 1 following the words “characterized in that”. The Division Bench observed that the Indian patent law does not accord any special status to the ‘characterized’ part of a claim.
According to the Division Bench, infringement analysis requires that claims be construed as a whole in light of the complete specification. In view of the faulty claim analysis, the order granting the injunction was stayed by the Division Bench. The Division Bench noted that the injunction order, prima facie, suffered from serious errors in claim construction and infringement analysis. The judgment restricted its infringement analysis to the part of Claim 1 which follows after the words “characterized in that”, which was not justified by the Patents Act, or the law laid down by the Supreme Court in Biswanath Radhey Shyam.
Case of the Appellant
The appellant submitted and contested the grant of the injunction on the ground that the Single Judge had examined only a limited part of the patent claim while assessing infringement. The appellant submitted that their product differs from the respondent’s claimed product on many counts. The appellant submitted that the curvature of the sealing bridge, in the suit patent, was perpendicular to the flow of the water, along a different axis, whereas the curvature in the case of the appellant’s FCV was in the direction of the flow of the water. The appellant contended that this aspect was not considered by the learned Single Judge and that there was no finding thereon.
Court’s Analysis and Findings
The Court found that the impugned judgment suffered from two errors of principle that led to the grant of the injunction. The first error was limiting the infringement analysis to the portion of Claim 1 in the suit patent by the Single Judge, which followed the words “characterized in that”. This led the Single Judge to ignore other distinguishing features between Claim 1 in the suit patent and the FCV of the appellants, notably the lengths of the inlet and outlet chambers, which were relevant to comparing the contesting claims of the parties. This was significant, as it also ignored the fact that the very technology on which the FCV forming the subject matter of the suit patent and the FCV of the appellants were based was fundamentally different.
The second error in the impugned judgment of the learned Single Judge arose because of a conflation in the said judgment, between the diaphragm and the sealing bridge, which form parts of the FCVs forming the subject matter of the dispute and, most significantly, the nature of the curvature of the sealing bridge in the two FCVs. The Court ruled that this qualified as an error on principle, as it pertained to the basic understanding of the suit patent, vis-à-vis the features of the appellants’ FCVs. This justified the Division Bench’s action to deviate from the settled position laid down by the Supreme Court in Wander Ltd. vs Antox India Pvt. Ltd., namely that appellate courts ordinarily do not interfere with discretionary interim orders, especially in intellectual property matters.
The Court examined the position of the patent law relating to the drafting of the complete specification and claims and its interpretation by the Court to conclude that such an approach by the Single Judge to confine the infringement analysis to the portion of Claim 1 following the words “characterized in that”, would be contrary to the law as it exists in India. The Division Bench observed that plain reading of Section 10 of the Patents Act, 1970, did not accord any special status to that part of a claim.
According to the Court, claims must be construed as a whole in light of the complete specification. The Court clarified that this discretion is exercised by the Single Judge on an incorrect understanding of the law, warranting intervention by the Division Bench at the appeal stage. The Court ruled that the impugned judgment, being based on a prima facie erroneous application of the law and the facts, was liable to be stayed. The Division Bench stayed the injunction order till the date of the next hearing.
Conclusion: Takeaways
In this case, the Division Bench acknowledged the applicability of the Supreme Court’s ruling in Wander Ltd. vs Antox India Pvt. Ltd., which holds that appellate courts ordinarily do not interfere with discretionary interim orders, especially in intellectual property matters. However, such restraint does not apply where discretion is exercised on the basis of an incorrect understanding of the law. In this case, the Division Bench found and noted that the impugned order of the learned Single Judge suffered from a basic misunderstanding of the nature of the invention forming the subject matter of the suit patent and the manner in which the product of the appellants was fundamentally different from the subject matter of the suit patent. The Division Bench found the approach of the Single Judge, where he gave special consideration to the part of the Claim, followed by the words “characterized in that” for undertaking the prima facies infringement analysis required to reach the decision to grant an injunction. The Division Bench ruled that such claim construction was not mandated by patent law in India.