By IANS
Chennai : Swiss pharma major Novartis had some relief Thursday in its legal battle in India as the Madras High Court restrained the Intellectual Property Appellate Board (IPAB) from hearing its appeal contesting the rejection of its patent application for a blood cancer drug. The same high court had thrown out Novartis’s challenge to the Indian patent laws Monday.
A division bench of the Madras High Court comprising Chief Justice A.P. Shah and Justice P. Jyothimani Thursday granted an interim stay for four weeks on another Novartis petition questioning the IPAB’s order.
The board had rejected the firm’s demand that technical member S. Chandrasekharan withdraw from hearing its appeal as he was part of the process of rejection of its application before the Patents Office here.
Following the rejection of its plea for a patent for the beta-crystalline form of imatinib mesylate, marketed under the brand name Glivec, by the Assistant Controller of Patents, Chennai, in January 2006, Novartis had initially filed the writ petition. The matter was transferred to the board after the central government constituted a bench of the IPAB.
The IPAB had on July 21 rejected the plea by Novartis to exclude the technical member from the bench.
Novartis raised objections to the presence of Chandrasekharan on the IPAB since he had originally taken a stand against the company.
The IPAB comprising chairman M.H.S. Ansari and Chandrasekharan had rejected the plea by saying that Chandrasekharan had earlier made his submissions in his official capacity as a statutory authority, but now he was an adjudicator.
Novartis moved the high court against this order of the IPAB.
The high court bench also issued notices to the central government and others Thursday and adjourned the hearing till Sep 10.