Calcutta High Court Refuses Interim Plea To Direct OpenAI To Show IndiaMart Links On ChatGPT

The Calcutta High Court on Wednesday refused to direct OpenAI to show IndiaMart links in ChatGPT responses, holding that the B2B platform has no prima facie legal right to demand visibility on the AI platform.

Justice Ravi Krishan Kapur, in an order dated May 20, dismissed IndiaMart InterMesh Ltd's application for interim relief, holding that the company had failed to establish a prima facie case and that the balance of convenience and irreparable injury also weighed against granting any interim order.

“No third party can compel a service provider to use its service in a manner to reflect its link or for its benefit,” the court observed, quoting the Delhi High Court's ruling in Google LLC vs DRS Logistics.

IndiaMart had approached the court alleging that ChatGPT was omitting links to its platform in response to certain user queries and instead directing users to individual sellers' websites, while allegedly providing platform links for rival services.

The company argued that this amounted to deliberate exclusion, disparagement, trademark dilution, and unfair trade practice, causing loss of business by diverting user traffic away from its marketplace.

OpenAI opposed the plea, contending that IndiaMart had no legal right, whether under contract, statute, or constitutional law, to insist on visibility on ChatGPT. It also said its decision not to display IndiaMart links stemmed from internal policy considerations, including reliance on the United States Trade Representative's 2024 Notorious Markets List, which names IndiaMart.

Justice Kapur held that OpenAI's decision to rely on the USTR report was an internal business policy that was not open to judicial scrutiny in the present proceedings.

The court also noted that IndiaMart had itself, at an earlier point, blocked ChatGPT from accessing its website.

On IndiaMart's intellectual property claims, the court found no prima facie case under trademark law. It held that dilution under Section 29(4) of the Trade Marks Act requires use of the mark “in the course of trade” and that mere referential identification of IndiaMart did not satisfy that threshold.

Rejecting the disparagement claim, the court held that there was no publication by OpenAI that could sustain an action for trade libel or injurious falsehood.

“Silence per se cannot constitute a cause of action,” the court said.

A significant issue before the court was whether ChatGPT should be treated as an “intermediary” under the Information Technology Act, 2000, like a conventional search engine, or as an “originator,” given its generative AI functions.

IndiaMart argued that if ChatGPT is treated as an intermediary, obligations under the IT Rules would apply.

The court, however, noted that the IT Act was enacted long before the emergence of generative AI and does not neatly account for technologies like large language models.

Justice Kapur drew a distinction between conventional search engines, which crawl and rank existing internet content, and generative AI systems, which synthesise and generate responses.

“They scour through volumes of data available on the internet, apply their algorithms to the same and then generate responses,” the court said of large language models.

The court observed prima facie that ChatGPT's generative qualities may place it closer to an “originator” than a passive intermediary, but clarified that the issue would require fuller adjudication with technical and expert evidence at trial.

“The loss of user traffic is translated as a potential loss of profit. Assuming that the petitioner is made visible in the manner complained of i.e. by displaying IndiaMart's website and seller listing URLs (IndiaMart Links) in the responses generated by ChatGPT then all the other grievances of the petitioner would be redressed. The obligation which is sought to be imposed on the respondents is prima facie neither just nor reasonable and the petitioner simply has to put up with the same otherwise there would be no end to such claims", the coury observed.

The court further held that granting the relief sought would amount to compelling specific performance requiring continuous judicial supervision, effectively granting the final relief itself at the interim stage.

The interim application was dismissed, and the parties were directed to take steps for expeditious hearing of the main suit.