IMPRESARIO ENTERTAINMENT & HOSPITALITY PVT. LTD v. SOCIAL HUB, THROUGH IT'S PROPRIETORMR. LAXMAN SI

In a suit filed by Impresario Entertainment & Hospitality Pvt. Ltd (“Plaintiff”), the Delhi High Court restrained the defendant from using the mark SOCIAL HUB or any marks/ trade name identical/ deceptively similar to the Plaintiff’s mark SOCIAL.

The Plaintiffs claimes to be engaged in restaurant services and is running various well-known cafes such as Smoke House Deli, The Tasting Room, Salt Water Cafe etc. The Plaintiff further claims to have conceived unique concept of “workspaces combined with coffee” in 2011-2012 and adopted the mark SOCIAL in 2014 in relation to its restaurant/ bars, for which it owns multiple registrations. Further the mark is written in a stencil font. The Plaintiff also promotes its services under the SOCIAL mark through its websites located at www.socialoffline.in and www.impresario.in. The Plaintiff also uses the SOCIAL mark in its social media pages and has generated huge revenue, thus has fame and reputation in general public.

As per the Plaintiff, the defendant opened a restaurant in Udaipur, under the mark SOCIAL HUB. According to the Plaintiff, the defendant intentionally used the term SOCIAL, to create consumer confusion that the Plaintiff has opened another outlet in Udaipur. The Plaintiff further claims that the defendant is using the website https://lnkd.in/gpiWGXPG and is using a tagline ‘Let’s Get Social’ with is identical/deceptively similar to the Plaintiff’s tagline ‘GET SOCIAL’.

The Court observed, based on the submissions made by the Plaintiff, that the Plaintiff has made out a prima facie case, balance of convenience lies in its favour and is likely to suffer irreparable harm in case the injunction is not granted. Accordingly, till date of next hearing, the court restrained the defendant from using the mark SOCIAL HUB or any other mark identical/ deceptively similar to the Plaintiff’s SOCIAL mark in any manner whatsoever.

Impresario Entertainment & Hospitality Pvt. Ltd. v. Social Hub, through its proprietor Mr. Laxman Singh Jhala, CS(COMM) 773/2022, Order dt. 10/11/2022