The Supreme Court (SC) of India has given an opportunity to Britannia Industries and ITC to settle a dispute over their biscuit packaging out of court.
This order, which was passed by justices Ranjan Gogoi and Navin Sinha, was given after the two companies sought time to resolve the dispute amicably.
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The bench of SC justices was quoted by PTI as saying: “The matter is adjourned sine die to enable the parties to effect an out-of-court settlement.”
The dispute between the companies began when ITC alleged that Britannia’s NutriChoice Zero digestive biscuit packaging closely resembled its Sunfeast Farmlite Digestive All Good biscuit.
ITC made an appeal at the SC against a Delhi high court order in March that allowed Britannia to use its blue and yellow coloured package for its Nutri Choice Digestive Zero biscuits.
The firm alleged that during the course of the case, Britannia sold its biscuit brand in blue and yellow packaging, but later changed the colour to yellow and purple packaging
Last September, the court had ordered Britannia to phase out the stock of NutriChoice Zero in blue and yellow packaging within a month.
Initially, Britannia agreed to change the blue colour but did not remove the yellow element as it was a prominent colour being used in packaging for its various digestive biscuits.
Later, it retracted its offer to change the blue colour and instead filed a lawsuit against ITC, alleging that the company was using yellow on its biscuit packaging.
