INDIA Law and Practice Contributed by: Pravin Anand, Achuthan Sreekumar and Rohil Bansal, Anand and Anand
In Saltman Engineering v Campbell Engineer - ing, reported at (1963) 3 All ER 413, the Court of Appeal held that the “confidential” information: “[M]ust not be something which is public prop - erty and public knowledge. On the other hand, it is perfectly possible to have a confidential document, be it a formula, a plan, a sketch, or something of that kind, which is the result of work done by the maker on materials which may be available for the use of anybody; but what makes it confidential is the fact that the maker of the document has used his brain and thus pro- duced a result which can only be produced by somebody who goes through the same process. A trade secret or a business secret may relate to a financial arrangement [or] the customer list of a trader and information in this regard would be of a highly confidential nature as being poten - tially damaging if a competitor obtained such information and utilised [this] to the detriment of the giver of the information. Business informa- tion such as cost and pricing, projected capital investments, inventory marketing strategies and a customer’s list may qualify as his trade secrets. Similarly, business information, such as cost and pricing, projected capital investments, inventory marketing strategies and a customer’s list may also qualify as trade secrets.” In Navigators Logistics v Kashif Qureshi; 2018 SCC OnLine Del 11321, the court, referring to Star India v Laxmiraj Seetharam, 2003 SCC OnLine Bom 27, held that everyone in any employment for a certain period would know certain facts and information without any spe - cial effort. Such persons cannot be said to know trade secrets or confidential information, and knowledge of such facts cannot be labelled as trade secrets.
In Ambiance India v Naveen Jain; 2005 SCC OnLine Del 367, it was stated that written day- to-day affairs of employment that are in the knowledge of many and are commonly known to others cannot be called trade secrets. It was further held that in a business house the employees discharging their duties come across so many matters, but all these matters are not trade secrets or confidential matters or formu - lae, the divulgence of which may be injurious to the employer; and if an employee on account of employment has learned certain business acu - men or ways of dealing with the customers or clients, this does not constitute trade secrets or confidential information. In Konrad Wiedemann v Standard Castings; [1985] (10) IPLR, the court relied on the obser - vations in the Saltman Engineering case to note that: “The information to be confidential must, I appre - hend, apart from contract, have the necessary quality of confidence about it, namely, it must not be something which is public property and public knowledge. On the other hand, it is per- fectly possible to have a confidential document, be it a formula, a plan, a sketch or something of that kind, which is the result of work done by the maker upon materials which may be available for the use of anybody; but what makes it confiden - tial is the fact that the maker of the document has used his brain and thus produced a result which can only be produced by somebody who goes through the same process.” In Indian Farmers Fertiliser v Commissioner of CE; 2007 (116) ECC 95, the tribunal defined a trade secret as follows: “A trade secret is such sort of information, which is not generally known to the relevant portion of
110 CHAMBERS.COM
Powered by FlippingBook