ABSTRACT
The issue of intellectual property has been a subject of debate in India following the ‘Paris Convention’ that required amendment of the Indian Patents Act of 1970 and subsequent negotiations in the Uruguay round of GATT on ‘Intellectual Property Rights’. Recognising the importance of stimulating inventions and encouraging the development of exploitation of new inventions for industrial progress of the country, several important changes were incorporated in new Act. Another important feature of the new Act was provision for compulsory search to ascertain the novelty of an invention before its acceptance. Domestic and export markets for Indian pharmaceutical products are estimated to increase four-fold by turn of the century. The concept of patents based originally on individual creativity and inventive genius, has now been transformed into an instrument of providing legal protection to research results emanating from large-scale research outfits. Patents as a legal instrument for promoting creativity appear to have been rendered irrelevant by recent trends in technological progress.
