Justice Prathiba Singh made last year’s list because of her instrumental role in setting up India’s first intellectual property-focused judicial forum, the Delhi High Court Intellectual Property Division.
This year, she was picked for handing down some excellent rulings as one of the first appointed judges of the newly established forum.
According to stakeholders, Singh hasn’t just been using judgments to resolve individual cases, she has also set out broad policy positions to help rights owners more generally.
In March, she took the IP office to task when she fined two officers for failing to disclose material facts in Dr Reddy’s Laboratories v Controller General of Patents Designs and Trademarks.
She also directed the IP office to formulate a plan to deal with the more than 200,000 oppositions pending before it.
In Dabur India v Ashok Kumar, she directed government authorities, ICANN, and domain name registrars to formulate solutions to curb malpractice from registrants.
Singh was also part of the two committees that released rules on the functioning of the IP division and adjudication of patent disputes in February.
These rules have made processing IP cases, particularly patent matters, much faster and easier.
Singh has held a judicial position for a little over five years – but her record already shows that having a former industry practitioner as a judge can lead to real and effective change.
