BCCI issues legal notice to Raj Kundra for the use of "IPL" in his Poker League

The BCCI has issued a legal notice to Raj Kundra over the use of ‘IPL’ in the promotions of his Match Indian Poker League. BCCI claimed that it is illegal to use ‘IPL’ proprietary name without proper licensing. The notice also stated that the ‘IPL’ is a name which is a legal property of the BCCI and therefore the board has all the rights to report the matter.

Earlier, the Supreme court had banned Kundra over his involvement in the spot-fixing scandal IPL 2013. The ex-owner of the Rajasthan Royals franchise was also not allowed to take part in the Charity football match played between the celebrities and the Indian cricketers. However, he felt that this notice is inappropriate and has a lot of errors.

The whole notice and what it read

“The BCCI has recently been made aware and thereby shocked to learn, of the International Federation of Poker’ (“IFP”) and Viaan Industries Limited’s (“Viaan”) blatantly unlicensed and illegal use of the ‘IPL’ proprietary name to promote the Match Indian Poker League (“Poker League”) on various platforms,” said the notice sent by BCCI as quoted by Pune Mirror.

The notice also further stated that nobody can use the ‘IPL’ as proprietary name without proper licensing as it is legally owned by the BCCI. “Therefore, any unlicensed commercial use of the ‘IPL’ name, whether on a standalone basis or in combination with other words, such as in the case of ‘Match IPL’, constitutes an infringement of the BCCI’s rights,” the notice said stating that the BCCI reserves the “right to take any further action it may deem appropriate to protect it rights and interests in this matter,” stated the notice.

The notice is inappropriate

In its reply Raj Kundra’s counsel termed the whole notice as inappropriate and also explained the whole matter in detail. “The use of term “IPL” in conjunction with the terms “MATCH” and “INDIAN POKER LEAGUE” is inherently distinctive and is verily allowed under law. More so, with the artistic elements, colour combination et al., the label mark is even more distinctive and is easily distinguishable. It is well established principle that a mark shall be considered as a whole for the purpose of comparison, which leaves no doubt that our client’s mark is completely different and dissimilar from each and every mark of your client. Evidently, there is no phonetic or visual similarity, which can lead to any confusion, whatsoever, which is, as a matter of fact, not even alleged by your clients in the letter,” said Kundra’s counsel Subhash Bhutoria.