The Delhi High Court on 5 November granted an ex parte ad-interim injunction in a commercial suit filed by Mahashian Di Hatti Private Limited (MDH), and restrained unidentified operators of fake dealership websites from misusing its intellectual property and directing domain registrars to lock and suspend the impugned websites within 72 hours.
Justice Vikas Mahajan held that unauthorised use of a company's registered trademarks and copyrighted works on fake dealership websites, including to solicit prospective dealers, warrants protection against trademark infringement and passing off. The Bench observed:
“Having considered the submissions of the learned counsel for the plaintiff and having perused the averments in the plaint and documents annexed thereto, this court is prima facie satisfied that the defendant nos. 1-4, by making unauthorized use of the plaintiff's trademarks and copyrighted works has infringed the plaintiff's Intellectual property, and their continued presence would cause prejudice and harm the business of the plaintiff, and mislead customers who are oblivious of the fact that all the mentioned impugned websites/domain names/email id's does not belong to the plaintiff.”
MDH told the Court that its business dates back to 1919 in Sialkot and was revived in Delhi after Partition. It was incorporated in 1965. It submitted that it holds trademark registrations for “MDH” and its formative marks in India and overseas, and that the mark features in the Trade Marks Registry's list of well-known trademarks.
It also claimed copyright over the layout, graphics and presentation of its official website, www.mdhspices.com, stating that it does not operate any other website.
During online monitoring in April 2026, MDH discovered several websites, domain names and email addresses incorporating “MDH” and falsely offering dealership, distributorship and franchise opportunities.
Three of the impugned websites or pages were operated by named defendants, including a Facebook page. MDH alleged that the operators displayed its registered address in Kirti Nagar to make their platforms appear genuine and induce prospective dealers to “part with and/or invest their money”.
The impugned domains included mdhmasalas.com and mdhspicesdealership.com, while the email addresses included care@mdhmasaladealership.in and info@mdhspice.in.
The Bench held that the balance of convenience favoured MDH and that it would suffer irreparable loss in the absence of an ex parte injunction.
Accordingly, the High Court restrained the first four defendants and anyone acting on their behalf from using or registering “MDH” or any identical, deceptively similar or formative variant across goods, services, domain names, websites, email addresses and social media accounts. It also restrained them from passing off their offerings as connected with or authorised by MDH.
For MDH: Advocates Neeraj Bhardwaj, Mohan Dewan, N.K. Bhardwaj, Rahul Maratha and Salil Oberoi