-The Business Standard The Novartis verdict by the Supreme Court emphasised the importance of flexibilities in drug patent laws, in contrast to Western countries which are seeking TRIPS-plus hardening through free-trade agreements As curtains on the six-year-long legal tussle with Swiss drug giant Novartis AG finally came down earlier this month, the Indian government did not waste a second in hailing the Indian patent law which it said was in "full...

-The Economic Times The recent patent rulings in India may get frequently challenged in international courts if the government yields to the European Union's demand of including matters related to intellectual property in the investors-state dispute mechanism in their proposed trade pact, health activist groups have warned. An investor-state dispute resolution mechanism typically allows foreign investors to sue countries for compensation if national laws, policies, court rulings of the country infringe upon...

-The Times of India BHOPAL/JABALPUR: The Madhya Pradesh government is compiling a list of convicted sexual offenders to ensure that they do not get government jobs as part of a series of measures to check crimes against women in the state. A government spokesperson said a DSP rank officer will be appointed in each district to check such crimes and that charge-sheets in these cases will be filed within two weeks. There has...

-The Hindu Public Interest Litigation is a good thing when it is used to enforce the rights of the disadvantaged. But it has now been diluted to interfere with the power of the government to take decisions on a range of policy matters Judicial activism is not an easy concept to define. It means different things to different persons. Critics denounce judicial decisions as activist when they do not agree with them....

India's decision this month to produce Germany-based multinational Bayer's anti-cancer drug Nexavar, in the first use of "compulsory licensing" in South Asia, will save lives but also raises intricate questions. Under the compulsory licensing process, a government can under World Trade Organization (WTO) rules bypass a patent owner's rights after three years and order the manufacture and sale of life-saving medicines at much cheaper cost than by obtaining the medicine from...