In a judgment that brings long-overdue clarity to the fraught boundary between copyright and design protection, the Supreme Court in Cryogas Equipment Pvt. Ltd. & LNG Express India Pvt. Ltd. v. Inox India Ltd. (2025 INSC 483) — dated 15.04.2025, has laid down a two-part test for assessing the applicability of Section 15(2) of the Copyright Act, 1957.

The case arose from a copyright infringement suit filed by Inox India, alleging that its engineering drawings and literary material related to LNG cryogenic trailers had been copied by the appellants. The defendants countered that Inox’s so-called artistic works were effectively unregistered designs, industrially applied far more than fifty times, and hence excluded from copyright protection under Section 15(2).

The Commercial Court had accepted that argument at the threshold under Order VII Rule 11 CPC, but the High Court reversed, restoring the suit for trial. The Supreme Court has now affirmed that restoration, but more importantly, it has used this case to create a structured legal framework for future disputes at the intersection of the Copyright Act and the Designs Act.

The Two-Test Framework (para 60)

To determine whether a work is barred from copyright protection under Section 15(2), the Court has prescribed the following:

1. Nature of the Work Test:
   Whether the work in question is purely an ‘artistic work’ entitled to protection under the Copyright Act or whether it is a ‘design’ derived from such original artistic work and subjected to an industrial process based upon the language in Section 15(2) of the Copyright Act ?
   
2. Functional Utility Test:
   If such a work does not qualify for copyright protection, then the test of ‘functional utility’ will have to be applied so as to determine its dominant purpose, and then ascertain whether it would qualify for design protection under the Design Act.

These tests must be factually grounded thereby meaning that the courts cannot apply Section 15(2) at the threshold stage unless the disqualification is self-evident from the plaint.

Why This Matters

This judgment provides long-awaited clarity on a persistent grey area in Indian IP law i.e. the overlap between copyright protection for technical drawings and design protection for industrial products. Works such as engineering schematics, product blueprints, or internal component layouts often blend artistic expression with utilitarian purpose, making their legal classification contentious.

This has two practical consequences:

• For rights holders: Copyright claims over technical or design-oriented works remain viable—but only if the creator can demonstrate that the work is not simply a functional design mass-produced for industrial use. The burden of proof will be on the plaintiff/claimant to show compliance with both limbs of the test.
  
• For defendants: The decision limits the use of Section 15(2) as a threshold defence. Courts are now discouraged from rejecting such suits prematurely. Unless the bar is evident on the face of the plaint, these disputes must proceed to trial on evidence.