High Court dismisses US court request in Pfizer-Cipla dispute

The Division Bench of the Madras High Court refused to enforce a Letters Rogatory issued by a US court that sought documentary and oral evidence from a Chennai-based pharma company in a patent dispute involving a drug marketed in the United States as Vyndamax.

- HD Bureau

The court ruled that the request constituted pretrial discovery of documents — a practice that signatory states of the Hague Evidence Convention may decline under Article 23 of the Hague Evidence Convention.Judges G. Jayachandran and Mummineni Sudheer Kumar overturned a Single Judge's earlier order that had permitted the enforcement of the Letters Rogatory against Softgel Healthcare Pvt. Ltd.. The bench observed that the request lacked the specificity required under the Convention’s Article 3, describing it as vague and omnibus in nature. The wide categories of documents and data sought encompassing manufacturing methods, polymor