IndiaMART May Ask Which Product Listings to Remove Under Brothers’ Territorial Family Settlement, Delhi HC Says

Ram Avtar Chamria and Rakesh Chamria filed a petition under Section 9 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996, alleging that Kamal Kumar Chamria was breaching a 1998 family settlement by offering products through online platforms.

The Commercial Court partly allowed the petition, restraining Kamal Kumar Chamria from selling specified products in certain territories and directing the relevant platforms, including IndiaMART, to take reasonable steps to address identified infringing listings.

IndiaMART appealed under Section 37(1)(b) of the Act, contending that the direction lacked sufficient identification of the URLs and products to be removed.

Section 9 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 empowers courts to grant interim measures in aid of arbitration;

the judgment referred to Rajeev Behl v. Bhupesh Kumar Dhingra & Ors., which recognises that appropriate Section 9 directions may extend to non-signatories, subject to the relief being connected to the arbitration and exercised sparingly.

The Court also considered Metro Shoes Ltd. v. Tolexo Online (P) Ltd., concerning an intermediary’s limited role and the provision of vendor details, and Happi Planet Eco Products (P) Ltd. v. Ravi Malani Trading As Febway India, concerning platform takedown directions based on listings supplied by the aggrieved party.

The Court noted that courts have generally required plaintiffs or aggrieved persons to provide the links to be removed.

The Court confined its consideration to IndiaMART’s role and did not address the merits of the injunction against Kamal Kumar Chamria.

It held that IndiaMART’s relevant function was to remove or delist infringing listings, while recognising the platform’s concern that the order did not identify the precise URLs or products.

In light of the practice of requiring specific links and the cited platform cases, the Court concluded that any uncertainty could be addressed by seeking clarification or modification from the Commercial Court that issued the order.

IndiaMART was granted liberty to apply to the Commercial Court for clarification or modification if required; pending applications were also disposed of.