In a trademark infringement suit filed by Baazi Group, the Hon’ble Delhi High Court has restrained several rogue gambling websites from operating in India under infringing domain names and branding. The Court took note of the fact that besides committing serious cyber-squatting, the unidentified gambling site owners are also employing advanced SEO technique to redirect the user traffic to their infringing and rogue websites/domains and are offering illegal gambling and betting services.
The Court noted from Baazi’s submissions that the impleaded gambling website owners have no physical presence in India but are promoting and offering prohibited casino, gambling and betting services in India. The Court also took note of the various advisories issued by the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, which strictly prohibited promotion and endorsement of online betting/ gambling platforms in India. In view of the glaring violation of Indian laws and serious loss to the Baazi Group, the Court has granted ex-parte ad interim injunction against the gambling websites from accessing, using, modifying or transferring the infringing domain names.
The Court also took cognizance of the fact that the Domain Name Registrars such as GoDaddy and Namecheap are facilitating sale of infringing domain names and hence are causing serious loss to the Plaintiff, Baazi Group. Upon its careful consideration of the complete scenario, the Court deemed it fit to also direct the Domain Name Registrars to suspend access and use of the infringing domain names and disclose details of the owner of each infringing domain name which is part of the list annexed with the Court’s order.
Baazi Group was led by Raj Shekhar Rao, Senior Advocate, who was briefed by Subhash Bhutoria, Anuja Negi and Ayesha Khan of LAW SB.
