Legal analysis and practical guidance on cross-border business, disputes, corporate, employment and IP matters across India and the UAE — including the Legal Help Desk, our Q&A column on the problems clients actually meet.
Short answer: A foreign filing licence in India is the written permission from the Controller of Patents that a person resident in India needs before applying for a patent outside India, unless an Indian application for the same invention was filed at least six weeks earlier and no secrecy direction applies (section 39 of the […]
Short answer: Form 27 is the statement that every patentee and every licensee of an Indian patent must file on whether the invention has been worked on a commercial scale in India, under section 146 of the Patents Act 1970 [1]. Since the Patents (Amendment) Rules 2024 it is filed once for each block of […]
Short answer: India AI regulation works through general laws rather than an AI-specific statute: the Government’s account of its framework, given to Parliament in August 2026, rests on the Information Technology Act 2000, the IT Rules 2021 and the criminal code, while MeitY’s India AI Governance Guidelines of November 2025 set a risk-based policy framework […]
Short answer: Outsourcing to India runs on the contract, because Indian law gives a foreign client few protections by default: ownership of deliverables, data handling, service levels, staff, exit and dispute resolution all have to be written into the vendor agreement. Copyright in code and other work product starts with the vendor or the individual […]
Short answer: A foreign brand owner can protect a mark in India by filing a national trademark application with the Trade Marks Registry or by designating India in an international application under the Madrid Protocol, which has applied to India since 8 July 2013 [1][2][3]. On either route the Indian Registry examines the mark under […]
Short answer: Under Indian law, a joint venture in India, an acquisition of an Indian company and a greenfield subsidiary all face the same exchange-control rules whenever the other party is Indian resident: a fair-value price floor, a 25% cap on deferred or escrowed consideration for up to 18 months, and no put option with […]
Short answer: FDI in India is permitted up to 100% under the automatic route in most sectors, including manufacturing, telecom and, since 2 May 2026, insurance: no prior approval, only filings with the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) after the money arrives [1][2][5]. Government approval through the National Single Window System (NSWS) is required in […]
Short answer: New investment sent into India directly from the UK, the EU (except Lithuania) or the United States has no bilateral investment treaty protection, so protection has to be built before the money goes in: contract clauses seated where an award can be enforced, immunity waivers from state counterparties, and political-risk insurance for the […]
Short answer: India has 22 trade agreements in force at 15 October 2026 by this page’s count: 16 free trade agreements (FTAs), from the 1998 Sri Lanka FTA to the UK CETA in force since 15 July 2026, and 6 narrower preferential trade agreements (PTAs) [1][2][3][4]. The New Zealand FTA enters into force on 20 […]
Short answer: India’s Digital Personal Data Protection Act 2023 (the DPDP Act) applies to processing of digital personal data in India, including by an Indian subsidiary or global capability centre (GCC), and to processing abroad connected with offering goods or services to people in India [1]. The Act’s main obligations, including the offshore reach, breach […]