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Gujarat High Court · body

2025 DIGILAW 677 (GUJ)

Prime Diamond Tech v. Sonani Jewels Pvt. Ltd.

2025-07-07

D.N.RAY, SUNITA AGARWAL

body2025
ORDER : SUNITA AGARWAL, CJ. These two connected petitions have been filed by the petitioners/defendant Nos. 1 to 4 in the suit, challenging the common order dated 25.06.2025 passed by the Commercial Court and 9 th Additional District Judge, Surat below Exhs. 124, 125 and 134 in Commercial TM C.S. No. 38 of 2021. 2. By means of the order impugned, the trial court has allowed the applications at Exh. 124 and 125 filed by the defendants/petitioners herein for seeking access to the contents of the sealed envelop filed by the plaintiff in the Court. Whereas, the application Exh. 134 was filed by the plaintiff for seeking an access to all the evidences collected during Local Commission carried out from the premises of the defendant No.1. 3. The trial court having noted the rival submissions of the learned counsels for the parties, has further noted that the plaintiff has submitted sealed envelop in the Court, which has not been allowed to be accessed by the defendants and the report of the Court Commissioner has also been submitted in the Court to opine that both the plaintiff and the defendants should be allowed to access such information subject to the conditions that the confidential information may not be disclosed to the third party. With the above, the learned advocates for the plaintiff and the defendants have been permitted to see the information or evidence collected by the Court Commissioner and the information contained in the sealed envelop filed by the plaintiff; respectively. 4. When the matter was argued, at the first blush, we were of the view that the evidence brought on record kept in the sealed envelop filed by the plaintiff and the information or evidence collected by the Court Commissioner, are the information which must be accessible to the parties to build their cases, as they are part of the evidence filed/collected, in or by the court. 5. However, on a deeper scrutiny of the matter, it was found that the main issue in the suit is about the breach on the part of the defendants in copying/using the same design/drawings and falsely representing them to be their developed work. The suit is for infringement of copyright and the application for temporary injunction filed by the plaintiff has already been rejected. The suit is for infringement of copyright and the application for temporary injunction filed by the plaintiff has already been rejected. The Apex Court vide order dated 09.09.2024 has directed the trial court to make an endevour to decide the suit within one year, giving limited reasonable opportunities to both the parties to lead their respective evidences for which a time schedule is to be notified in advance. 6. As per the plaintiff averments, defendant Nos. 2 to 5 were employees of the plaintiff company and, as such, have been given access to all such information as to process, technical know-how, mechanism, proportions and were taught/trained with the entire technological process and were provided all trade secret informations regarding HPHT technology for treatment of diamonds and trade secret with the obligation that the said information shall not be disclosed and to be used solely for the benefit for the plaintiff. It is the case of the plaintiff that all such information as to the process, technical know-how, mechanism, proportions, ratio, components, chemicals and other materials used are all either proprietary information of the plaintiff or exclusively licensed to it and all are kept as trade secret or confidential. As the plaintiff has build up its case of confidentiality and its immense value as a commercial trade secret, such informations have been provided to the Court alongwith the list of documents in three sealed envelop Nos. 1, 2 and 3, alongwith the plaint. 7. As regards the evidence collected by the Court Commissioner, on an application filed by the plaintiff on 10.05.2021 being Exh. 6 under Order XXVI Rule 9, CPC, the trial court vide order dated 12.05.2021/13.05.2021 appointed a Court Commissioner for carrying inspection of the factory, which included the inspection of factory premises of the defendant No.1 company. The stand of the defendant is that both the orders of the Commercial Court restricted the Commissioner’s inquiry to the infringing material only. 6 under Order XXVI Rule 9, CPC, the trial court vide order dated 12.05.2021/13.05.2021 appointed a Court Commissioner for carrying inspection of the factory, which included the inspection of factory premises of the defendant No.1 company. The stand of the defendant is that both the orders of the Commercial Court restricted the Commissioner’s inquiry to the infringing material only. However, on 14.05.2021 and 15.05.2021, when the Court Commissioner carried out the commission at the defendant No1’s premises, having failed to obtain any information or data which indicated infringement, the Commission indiscriminately transferred all data, confidential information and documents from the devices of the defendant, which had no bearing on the alleged infringement by using the defendant’s devise using extensions such as .pdf(for all pdf files), .doc and .docx (for all word files), .xlsx (for all excel datasheets), .sldprt and .sldasm (for all engineering modeling files) etc.. The contention is that the sealed cover prepared by the Court Commissioner was divided into three folders namely photographs, file extensions and keywords. The photograph folder further contained two folders containing ‘highly confidential photos’ which are about 70 in number and another folder contained non-confidential photos, which were about 850 in number. 8. Consequent to the commission and the inspection of his premises, the defendant No.1 filed objections to the manner in which the Commission was undertaken at Exh. 63/64 on 08.06.2021 itself. It is the case of the defendant that the Commission was conducted went beyond the scope of the order dated 12.05.2021 and 13.05.2021 and a wide search to download material which had no bearing with the suit proceedings. An application Exh. 82 dated 23.07.2021 has been filed by the defendant detailing the objections alongwith the photographs of the Court Commissioner’s proceedings which recorded the presence of plaintiff company’s director, the plaintiff’s authorised representative and its legal representative, during the Court Commission, at the premises of the defendant. 9. The submission is that on an application filed by the plaintiff to inspect/access the Commission’s report, by order dated 24.05.2021, the Commercial Court partly allowed the said application granting permission to the plaintiff to view the photographs and videos. On 26.05.2021, another application being Exh. 47 was filed before the Commercial Court seeking to inspect the material/data/evidence filed by the Court Commission and submitted in sealed cover. On 26.05.2021, another application being Exh. 47 was filed before the Commercial Court seeking to inspect the material/data/evidence filed by the Court Commission and submitted in sealed cover. On 26.05.2021, the Commercial Court reconstituted a Confidentiality Club in view of the joint pursis dated 26.05.2021 filed by both the parties. The Confidentiality Club members of the defendants were allowed to access the photographs/videos that were part of the Commission Report and it was further directed that if there is any material which the defendant finds highly confidential, they may share such file name with the plaintiff and such files shall not be permitted to be viewed by the plaintiff’s confidentiality club member. It was further observed by the Commercial Court in the said order itself that the said file name shall also be disclosed before the Court by way of purshis so that the objection with respect thereto can be separately decided . 10. In light of these facts brought on record by the plaintiff and the defendants as noted from the plaint and the pleadings filed before us, it seems that both the parties have filed their applications to have access to the information which is brought on record as a part of the trade secret by the plaintiff and collected by the Court Commission during the investigation carried out by it in the defendant’s premises. The defendants have filed the application Exhs. 124 and 125 with the prayer to access/inspect the contents of the envelop filed by the plaintiff alongwith its suit which was marked as Exh.9, on the premise that the stage of examination is arrived and in support of its defence, the defendants shall have access to the documents filed by the plaintiff. On the other hand, the plaintiff filed application Exh. On the other hand, the plaintiff filed application Exh. 134 seeking access to the documents and all other evidences collected during the Court Commission proceedings, on the premise that it was permitted access to only the photographs and videos of the Commission’s proceedings, but needed access to the entire record claiming that the defendants were “blatantly replicating the subject technology” It is the case of the defendants that all non- confidential information / material / photographs / videos have already been seen by the plaintiff and the remaining being “highly confidential material” of the defendant’s, cannot be permitted to be viewed by the plaintiff even in terms of the directions of the Commercial Court in its order dated 26.05.2021. 11. It was also the case of the defendants/petitioner herein that the objections to the report of the Local (Court) Commission filed by the defendant are pending adjudication. The submission of the learned counsel for the petitioners herein is that access to the confidential information, which has been illegally collected by the Court Commission, cannot be permitted to even the learned advocate for the plaintiff. 12. Both the learned counsels for the parties, at this stage, reached at the consensus to the extent that the confidential information/material filed by the plaintiff and collected by the Court Commission under the order of the commercial court being part of the trade secret of the plaintiff and the defendants, are not accessible to the rival parties. On a query made by the Court, the learned counsel for the plaintiffs/respondents herein categorically stated that the information provided in the sealed envelop at Exh.9 are trade secret of the plaintiff and it would be unjustifiable to give access to the said information, which may not be in the knowledge of the defendants as on date though the defendant Nos. 2 and 3 have misused the trade secret for the business of the defendant No.1 established by them. The same view has been expressed by the learned senior counsel for the defendants/petitioners herein. The contention of the learned senior counsel for the petitioners herein is that the information collected by the Court Commission illegally from the premises of the defendant No.1, contrary to the order appointing the Court Commission, are confidential information and trade secret of the defendant No.1, which cannot be divulged to the plaintiff. 13. The contention of the learned senior counsel for the petitioners herein is that the information collected by the Court Commission illegally from the premises of the defendant No.1, contrary to the order appointing the Court Commission, are confidential information and trade secret of the defendant No.1, which cannot be divulged to the plaintiff. 13. Taking note of the above, we find that the commercial court while allowing the applications filed by the defendants and plaintiff, i.e. Exhs. 124, 125 and 134; respectively, though has given limited access to the learned advocates for the parties to see the information contained in the sealed envelop filed by the plaintiff and the information or evidence collected by the local commission, but while doing so, the Court has completely overlooked the important aspect of the matter that both the rival parties are objecting to divulgence of their trade secret information to the other party. In our considered opinion, if rival parties cannot have access to the information which are trade secret information placed on record by the other party, there is no reason to give access to the said information to the lawyers appearing on their behalf. Moreover, no reasoning has been given by the trial court for giving such permission by allowing applications filed by the rival parties vide order impugned dated 25.06.2025. There is no consideration to the previous order of the court dated 26.05.2021, whereby limited information, which were part of the Court Commission’s report, was already provided to the plaintiff and the defendant both, in a way that no party can have confidential information or trade secret of each other. 14. We may simply say that in a copyright suit, divulging of trade secret of each other to the rival parties would be antithesis to the whole concept. 15. Taking note of the above, while quashing the order dated 25.06.2025, the applications Exh. 124, 125 filed by the defendants and Exh. 134 application filed by the plaintiff, are hereby rejected. 16. The commercial court is directed to proceed with the suit in an expeditious manner so as to strictly comply with the directions of the Apex Court in the order dated 09.09.2024. It goes without saying that all the pending applications filed by the plaintiff or the defendants, if any, including the objections to the Court Commission’s report, shall be duly dealt with at an appropriate stage. It goes without saying that all the pending applications filed by the plaintiff or the defendants, if any, including the objections to the Court Commission’s report, shall be duly dealt with at an appropriate stage. The dismissal of the abovenoted applications filed by the plaintiff and the defendants for divulging information to each other by this order, would have no bearing on the merits of the case of the parties, inasmuch as, all necessary steps to bring the dispute to its logical end, strictly in accordance with law, can very well be taken by the commercial court in its own wisdom. 17. It is further clarified that, at this stage, we do not find any reason to give access to the learned advocates for the parties to the confidential information/trade secret of the rival parties. It is, however, open for the commercial court to form its own independent opinion at an appropriate stage, on appreciation of evidence before it, to do the needful by taking a just decision in accordance with law, without being influenced by any of the observations made hereinabove. 18. With the above, both the above petitions stand disposed of.