Exotic Mile Vs. Imagine Marketing Pvt Ltd.

Recently, a Division Bench of the Delhi High Court, while dismissing an appeal, upheld an order passed by a Single Judge of the Delhi High Court to restrain Exotic Mile (“Appellant”) from manufacturing and marketing audio gadgets under its registered trade mark BOULT and its formative variants, owing to its deceptive similarity to the BOAT-formative marks registered in favour of Imagine Marketing Private Limited. (“Respondent”).

At the outset, the Respondent had initiated a civil suit against the Appellant in the Delhi High Court, pursuant to which, the Court granted an ad interim injunction, and passed an order restraining the Appellant from using BOULT-formative marks. The Respondent was able to establish that the prevalence of goods under the BOULT-formative marks were causing actual instances of confusion among consumers, who on account of the phonetic similarities between the rival marks, were led to believe that the Appellant’s goods were associated with the Respondent. The Court, subsequently, passed an order restricting not only use of the BOULT-formative marks, but also use of a tagline “UNPLUG YOURSELF” and the name “BOULT BASS BUD” for one of the products. Aggrieved by the order, the Appellant preferred the present appeal.

The Court, however, set aside the injunction against the tagline stating that the Respondent had not requested this relief. Nonetheless, the Court upheld the injunction against the BOULT and BOULT AUDIO marks, considering that the Respondent had prior use and goodwill, and that the rival marks were phonetically similar. While the Appellant argued that phonetic similarities will have minimal effect on the consumer choices given that most sales for both the parties are through online channels, the Court held that the possibility of likelihood of confusion will still be prevalent if the consumer is unable to recollect the exact name of the product which they want to purchase online. The aspect of phonetic similarity may be of somewhat lesser significance when the products are sold online but it cannot be said to be altogether irrelevant. Further, while the rival products are largely sold online, neither party denied that their products are sold in brick-and-mortar stores as well.

Exotic Mile Vs. Imagine Marketing Pvt Ltd. [FAO(OS) (COMM) 20/2020], pronounced on September 15, 2025

Read the judgement copy here.