Balancing Competing of Interest Regarding Patents and Copyrights in Sri Lanka; a Look at the Intellectual Property Act No 36 of 2003

International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science (IJRISS) | Volume II, Issue VI, June 2018 | ISSN 2454-6186

Balancing Competing of Interest Regarding Patents and Copyrights in Sri Lanka; a Look at the Intellectual Property Act No 36 of 2003

James K.A.A.N. Thilakarathna

Attorney-at-Law
Department of Law, CINEC Campus, Malabe, Sri Lanka

Abstract:- Considering the special nature of intellectual property as an intangible product of human intellect, Intellectual Property Act No 36 of 2003 has been imposed to handle the intellectual property rights in Sri Lanka Concurrent demands for protecting the rights of the inventors, while restricting them form keeping undue monopolies give rise to conflicting interests in the field. In achieving a balance between these two competing interests, the Act attempts to incorporate certain guidelines based on the standards set out by the World Trade Organization (WTO) in TRIPS (Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property). However, hardly any systematic analysis has been done to examine how these guidelines make the balance between competing interests in Sri Lankan context and thus the present paper aims to evaluate whether the measures taken under the Act are sufficient to achieve this desired balance relating to patents and copyrights. The article is written using a qualitative method by using the relevant sections of the Act which are evaluated through scholarly writings and decided case law. It can be seen that while at times the Act has complied with the minimum standards set out under the TRIPS regime and sometimes even going beyond the parameters and giving TRIP Splus protection, there are some areas such as Traditional Knowledge (TK) where the Act has been unable to provide a suitable amount of protection under patents or copyrights. The article therefore concludes on these shortcomings and suggest possible changes that could be implemented to overcome with these lacunas.

Key Words: Intellectual Property, Patents, Copyrights, IP Act No 36 2003

I. INTRODUCTION

We must stop thinking of intellectual property as an absolute and start thinking of it as a function – as a process, which, if it is to be successful, must meet diverse aims: the assurance of a fair reward to creators and inventors and the encouragement of research and creativity, on the one hand: and on the other hand, the widest possible dissemination of the ideas and products of which the world, and all the individuals in it, have such great need (Henderson, 1993).

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