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Informist, Wednesday, Mar. 18, 2026

 

NEW DELHI – The division bench of the Delhi High Court Wednesday rejected the Embassy of Peru's plea against Chile over the exclusive use of "Pisco" brandy name in India. The division bench upheld its single bench order which said Peru will only be entitled to use "Peruvian Pisco" and the petitioner cannot claim exclusive rights over the name "Pisco". 

 

"Both Peru and Chile had established use of the mark 'Pisco' for alcoholic beverages. Section 9a (of Geographical Indications of Goods (Registration and Protection) Act, 1999) is a bar to the grant of a standalone Pisco GI (Geographical Indication) to Peru," said the bench of Justices C. Hari Shankar and Om Prakash Shukla.

 

Peru and Chile have a shared history in the manufacture of the Pisco beverage in the Ica region of Peru, and Copiapo and Coquimbo regions of the Republic of Chile. There are seven kinds of Pisco manufactured across these regions. The beverage has been manufactured for centuries in regions which are part of present-day Chile and Peru. Definitive political boundaries were established only between 1880 and 1940. However, the production of Pisco continued in both countries. 

 

The Embassy of Peru had filed a geographical indication application in India before the Registrar of Trademarks and Geographical Indicators for use of the name "Pisco". In 2009, the registrar passed an order registering the name "Peruvian Pisco" in favour of the Embassy of Peru. In an appeal, the Intellectual Property Appellate Board set aside the registrar's order and allowed the Embassy of Peru to use the "Pisco" name.  

 

Association De Productores De Pisco A.G., an association of producers of the alcoholic beverage Chilean Pisco in some regions of Chile, challenged the appellate board's order in the high court. The grant of the "Pisco" name to Peru was in bad faith, as the region which produces the brandy was shared between Republic of Chile and Republic of Peru, said the association. 

 

The single-judge bench of Justice Mini Pushkarna said that the beverage from Chile was also recognised and identified over the world as Pisco, therefore, grant of a geographical indicator for the name exclusively to Peru without specifying the latter's geographical indicator would be detrimental to the legal and legitimate commercial interest of producers of the brandy in Chile. Challenging the single judge's order, the Embassy of Peru had moved the division bench.  End

 

Reported by Surya Tripathi

Edited by Tanima Banerjee

 

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