Director General of WIPO Visits CSIR-Traditional Knowledge Digital Library
In a significant stride towards fostering global collaboration in the realm of intellectual property protection, Mr. Daren Tang, Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), led a distinguished delegation to visit the CSIR-Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) facility. The visit was marked by insightful discussions encompassing the CSIR Innovation System, TKDL, CSIR Technologies, and CSIR’s Current IP Strength & Strategy.
Accompanying Tang were esteemed delegates from WIPO, including Prof. Unnat P. Pandit, Controller General of Patents, Designs & Trade Marks (CGPDTM), and representatives from the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), the office of the CGPDTM, and the Ministry of AYUSH.
Dr. N. Kalaiselvi, Secretary, DSIR, and Director General of CSIR, led the CSIR team, offering valuable insights into CSIR’s impressive intellectual property legacy, including its intellectual property rights (IPR) policy and strategy. She warmly welcomed Mr. Tang and underscored the potential for collaborative efforts between CSIR and WIPO, emphasizing that the visit would enhance the innovation ecosystem within the CSIR family.
Mr. Daren Tang shared WIPO’s vision to promote inclusiveness and establish itself as a powerful catalyst for transforming the intellectual property system. He expressed his satisfaction with India’s longstanding science and technology capacity and commended CSIR’s role as a key Indian innovator. He also acknowledged CSIR’s impactful initiatives, such as the TKDL, its focus on intellectual property aligned with Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), Patinformatics, and IP Audit. Mr. Tang expressed WIPO’s full support for a meaningful and impactful partnership with CSIR.
The visit to the CSIR-TKDL Unit provided an opportunity to showcase the digitization of ancient Indian texts related to traditional medicine, including Ayurveda, Unani, Siddha, Sowa Rigpa, Yoga, and third-party submissions. These efforts aim to prevent the misappropriation of traditional knowledge through erroneous grants of intellectual property. The WIPO delegates engaged with the CSIR-TKDL team, gaining insights into the interdisciplinary nature of this groundbreaking work and its significance as a unique prior art database of traditional knowledge. Mr. Daren Tang and the WIPO team recognized the importance of the TKDL and endorsed it as a necessary strategy for South-South cooperation.
During the exhibition, CSIR highlighted its globally benchmarked technologies and potential game-changing pursuits in the pipeline to the delegates. The DG of WIPO and the CGPDTM applauded the CSIR’s objective-oriented technologies and well-thought-out intellectual property strategy, requesting that the details of these showcased technologies be included in the national IP Compendium being compiled by the Office of CGPDTM.
About CSIR-TKDL: The Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) is a pioneering Indian initiative dedicated to preventing the exploitation and safeguarding Indian traditional knowledge from wrongful patents, particularly at international patent offices. India’s rich and time-tested traditional medicinal knowledge, documented in languages such as Sanskrit, Hindi, Arabic, Persian, Urdu, Tamil, etc., is often inaccessible and incomprehensible to patent examiners at international patent offices. The TKDL houses Indian traditional medicine knowledge available in the public domain, primarily related to classical/traditional texts on Ayurveda, Unani, Siddha, and Sowa Rigpa, in a digitized format. It is available in five international languages (English, French, German, Spanish, and Japanese).
About WIPO: The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) serves as the global forum for intellectual property (IP) services, policy, information, and cooperation. As a self-funding agency of the United Nations with 193 member states, WIPO’s mission is to lead the development of a balanced and effective international IP system that fosters innovation and creativity for the benefit of all. WIPO’s mandate, governing bodies, and procedures are established in the WIPO Convention, which founded WIPO in 1967. Among its core functions, WIPO provides a policy forum for shaping international IP rules, offers global services to protect IP across borders, resolves disputes, and facilitates cooperation and capacity building in all countries.
