Supreme Court Dismisses MakeMyTrip's Plea Against Delhi HC Order In Google's Favour In Ads Case

The travel agency MakeMyTrip (MMT) claimed that its trademarks, “Makemytrip” and “MMT”, were being used as keywords in Google Ads to display ads and links of its rival Booking.com.

A three-judge bench of the Supreme Court headed by CJI DY Chandrachud dismissed the plea by MakeMyTrip. ( Image Source :PTI )

The Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed a petition by online travel agency 'Make My Trip' against Delhi High Court's decision in favour of Google in the Trademark matter. In December 2023, the Delhi High Court had set aside a single judge's order which restrained Google and Booking.com from using 'MakeMyTrip' mark, with or without spaces, as a keyword on the Google Ads Program.

A three-judge bench of the Supreme Court headed by CJI DY Chandrachud dismissed the plea by MakeMyTrip.

The high court ruled that the mere use of trademarks on Google Ads did not amount to infringement under the Trade Marks Act, 1999. The travel agency MakeMyTrip (MMT) claimed that its trademarks, “Makemytrip” and “MMT”, were being used as keywords in Google Ads to display ads and links of its rival Booking.com.

Senior Advocate Mukul Rohatgi appearing for MakeMyTrip said that his client has registered the trademark. And if one writes 'Make My Trip' on Google then a Booking.com add appears on top. The MakeMyTrip website appears below it. Google takes charges for this. And as the Booking.com is paying the charges it gets more primacy though using a trademark owned by MakeMyTrip. He argued that Booking.com is piggy-backing on MakeMyTrip's reputation.

Senior Advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi appearing for Google US told the court that the word 'Make My Trip' doesn't appear anywhere on the screen or anywhere on the advertisement site, it doesn't appear in the trademark form and there is no premise of confusion. 

Singhvi further told the court that one should not underestimate the intelligence of the users and they would not be misled.

Earlier, in December 2023, a Delhi High Court division bench of Justice Vibhu Bakhru and Justice Amit Mahajan observed that Booking.com is a well-known and popular platform offering travel services. The court said that it cannot accept that an internet user is likely to be misled into believing that the services offered by it are those of MakeMyTrip.

MakeMyTrip had moved court to stop Google and Booking.com from adopting or using its registered word marks as keywords through the Google Ads Program or using them in any manner amounting to infringement of its trademarks.

In April 2023, a single-judge granted interim injunction in favour of MakeMyTrip. The court had then noted that use of its registered mark by competitors even as meta-tags is an infringement under the Trademarks Act. And a third party bidding on trademarks as sponsored keywords for use by internet search engines can lead to misrepresentation. This order was then challenged by Google and later overruled by a two-judge bench of Delhi High Court in December 2023. Following which, MakeMyTrip moved the Supreme Court against this order.