SpicyIP Tidbit: Smoke and Mirrors: BHC Denies Interim Relief After Finding Both Parties Approached with Unclean Hands
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[This post is authored by Anushka Kanabar. Anushka is a fourth-year B.A., LL.B. (Hons.) student at the National Law School of India University. Her previous posts can be accessed here.]
A recent decision by the Bombay High Court in Velji Karamshi Vaid v. V3 Fashion & Ors. illustrates the deciding role principles of equity like the clean hands doctrine can play in interim injunction proceedings. Through an order dated September 9, 2025, the Court dismissed Velji Karamshi Vaid’s application for an interim injunction, not on a finding on the merits of the trademark dispute at hand, but on its finding that both parties had failed to approach the court with the candor required for discretionary relief.
The clean hands doctrine mandates that a party seeking the court’s discretionary relief, such as an interim injunction, must do so with honesty and transparency. It has been applied by Indian courts to varying degrees of consistency, to deny relief where a litigant has suppressed material facts or made misleading statements. As previously discussed on the blog, this doctrine has even been invoked to impose exemplary costs in the context of medicinal marks (Sun Pharma v. DWD Pharma, discussed here), modify the terms of an injunction to benefit the infringing defendant (Mittal Electronics v. Sujata Home Applications, discussed here), to vacate an injunction (DCM Shriram v. Amreek Singh, discussed here). You will notice in these posts how it is typically only the plaintiff’s conduct that is under the scanner; Velji on the other hand involves the curious case of a situation where the court found neither party deserving of equity’s protection.
Velji Vaid claimed rights over the marks “V3” and the device “Volume 3” for garments, and sued the defendants for using the allegedly infringing the marks “V3 STYLE” and the device “V3”. V3 fashion took the defence of prior use, alleging that they had been using these marks since 2017.
The judgement indicates that the inconsistencies in both parties’ positions made it impossible to determine the truth at the interim stage. Velji Vaid’s case was undermined by the inconsistency in the dates of claimed usage – the plaint claimed use of the “V3” mark since 2016, but their own trademark application for the mark, filed in 2018, was on a “proposed to be used” basis. This discrepancy was compounded by the emergence of yet another use date in a trademark examination report, indicating that the mark was in use since September 2018. Since their entire infringement case turned on prior adoption, this shifting timeline of use-claims severely damaged their credibility before the Court.
Another aspect on which the Court found that Velji Vaid suppressed material facts was the prosecution history of the marks. During the registration process, the Trademark Registry had cited conflicting third-party marks containing “V3,” such as “V3 Fashion Studio” and “V3 Jeans.” In response, V successfully argued that their mark was a composite label and that these other marks were not in conflict. But before the Bombay High Court, Velji Vaid took the opposite position, arguing that the defendants’ use of “V3” was inherently deceptive. The Court held that this failure to disclose a prior contrary stand before the Registry was a material suppression, following its prior precedent in Phonepe v. Resilient Innovations, wherein it was held that a plaintiff may disentitle itself from discretionary relief by withholding the stand taken by it before the Registry.
V3 Fashion’s case was equally problematic: its entire defence, that of prior use since 2017, rested on a set of invoices, the validity of which came under serious doubt during the proceedings. A co-defendant (an erstwhile partner) filed an affidavit alleging that these invoices were fabricated and bore his GST number and contact details without his consent. The Court noted that these were serious allegations of forgery, even involving a police complaint, and yet went entirely uncontroverted by V3 Fashion. This left the court with no reliable evidence to substantiate the prior use claim. Furthermore, just like Velji Vaid, V3 Fashion had taken a completely contradictory stand in a separate rectification proceeding, arguing that “V3” was a distinctive mark and that any similar use would cause confusion.
Faced with these mutual failures of disclosure and consistency, the court invoked the core equitable maxim that “a person who seeks equity must do equity.” It relied on Supreme Court precedent reiterating that a person that comes to court without clean hands is not entitled to be heard on the merits of his grievance. Since this was an interim injunction proceeding and not a full trial, with the substance of the parties’ claims left unverified, the Court found that the determination of prior use – which was the cornerstone of the dispute – was impossible on the unreliable record before it. So it arrived at the only equitable course available to it: denying interim relief.
The Velji decision therefore serves as a reminder of the procedural rigor inherent in trademark jurisprudence, a rigor that all parties – not merely plaintiffs – are subject to. The specific aspects of the doctrine highlighted in the case are the importance of consistency in pleadings and the absolute necessity of disclosing all material facts, including prosecution history, to the court.