New Delhi: The Union Ministry of Commerce has withdrawn crucial financial and administrative powers of Unnat P. Pandit, Controller General of Patents, Designs and Trade Marks (CGPDTM), documents accessed by ThePrint show.
These orders, diminishing his status as the head of the powerful body that grants intellectual property rights (IPR) in the country, were issued over the last eight months. Besides, Pandit was also served with three show cause notices seeking explanation from him for alleged financial and administrative irregularities.
Despite losing his powers significantly, Pandit continues to hold the top post of the department that supervises working of some important laws, such as the Patents Act, 1970, Designs Act, 2000 and Trade Marks Act, 1999.
Pandit courted controversy earlier this year, when the Union Ministry of Law and a central government law officer invalidated over three lakh trademark rights that were granted by “outsourced contractual employees” of the Office of CGPDTM. The ministry and law officer’s legal opinion held these trademarks to be in violation of the law that allows only full-time employees to grant trademark rights.
As previously reported by ThePrint, Pandit’s appointment as CGPDTM has also been challenged. Posted before a bench led by Delhi High Court Chief Justice Manmohan, the public interest litigation (PIL) filed by the association of Group A patents officers claims that Pandit’s hiring was done in complete disregard of the process laid down for such an appointment.
The high court is yet to issue a notice on the PIL. During the hearing Wednesday, Pandit’s lawyer Tanmay Mehta had accused the association of misleading the court. Mehta submitted that Pandit had issued show cause notices to some of the Group A officers who had challenged the same before the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT). The lawyer contended that the association should have disclosed this fact to the court.
In response, the association’s lawyers, senior advocate Sanjay Hegde and advocate Gyanant Singh, informed the bench that the ministry had taken away Pandit’s powers to transfer officers and also curtailed his authority to take decisions in financial matters.
Orders curtailing Pandit’s powers
Documents reviewed by ThePrint show that in January this year, the Commerce Ministry had issued an order that restricted the CGPDTM from undertaking any “capital expenditure, encompassing the acquisition of IT-related equipment, software, cloud services and procurement via tender processes”. Instead, such initiatives will be managed and executed by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), the order had clarified.
DPIIT, an agency working under the commerce ministry, develops and implements strategies for the growth of India’s industrial sector.
The January order had followed a show cause notice issued to Pandit after he had purchased “cloud service options” without seeking DPIIT’s approval.
Later, in July, DPIIT took out another order revising the transfer policy related to Group A officers of Patents & Designs. The updated transfer policy did not just take away Pandit’s sole authority in matters of transfer by introducing a placement committee that would comprise an officer from the ministry, it also restrained him from issuing mid-term transfers of the officers. According to the policy, mid-term transfers would be considered only in exceptional circumstances on a case-to-case basis with DPIIT’s approval.
The transfer policy was revised following a litigation mounted against Pandit by patent officers, who had challenged his orders to transfer them before CAT.
The latest DPIIT order of 27 August further scales down Pandit’s position as CGPDTM. It has withdrawn the controller general’s authority to supervise the information technology wing of the department, and allocated it to DPIIT director Subhash Chandra Karol.
This order comes close on the heels of the Delhi High Court issuing a notice to the commerce ministry and CGPDTM on a petition accusing the latter’s IT wing of transferring patent cases from one bench to another without complying with the rules. According to the petition, the IT wing, which was set up to computerise marking and listing of cases without manual intervention, had transferred these cases in the absence of any written orders.
In a severe snub to Pandit, DPIIT had also set aside all notices issued by him to 259 officials on 26 June. According to DPIIT’s office memorandum, these notices were not in line with the established procedure. These were issued to officials for not meeting their targets to decide cases within a specific time period. The DPIIT directed CGPDTM to withdraw the notices after the officials moved CAT, claiming that Pandit was legally incompetent to issue such a notice.
On 29 March, DPIIT had served two show cause notices to Pandit. The first one dealt with the contractual hiring of employees, who were given quasi-judicial postings, in alleged violation of the Trademarks Act, 1999.
The second notice had asked Pandit to submit an explanation as to why disciplinary action should not be initiated against him for violating delegated financial powers. This notice was sent for alleged administrative lapses in the purchase of 1,200 computers costing over Rs 9 crore.
(Edited by Mannat Chugh)
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