AI should not be outrightly rejected: Supreme Court Justice KV Viswanathan

Artificial Intelligence (AI) need not be outrightly rejected, although a final call on how far it should be used needs some consideration, Supreme Court judge Justice KV Viswanathan recently opined. .He was speaking at an event organised at the Delhi High Court on December 11 to launch a commentary on Patent Law authored by advocate Adarsh Ramanujan.During his address, Justice Viswanathan praised the book, particularly for its "fascinating discussion” on artificial intelligence and its interplay with patent law. “I don't think that AI should be outrightly rejected. It calls for a certain amount of thought before we take a final call on it,” Justice Viswanathan said..Conceived during the COVID-19 lockdown period, Ramanujan’s commentary published by Oakbridge Publishing, offers a critical analysis into myriad of issues concerning the growth of patent law, patentability, artificial intelligence, patent bargain theory and international law on patents..Supreme Court judge Justice Manmohan was also among the dignitaries who attended the book launch event. “Patent law is where future lies. It is a growing field that puts the lawyer first," Justice Manmohan said. He went on to refer to recent data released by World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) indicating an increase in patent applications filed at the Indian Patent Office. The judge observed that this is an “encouraging trend.”He lauded the lawyers and judges at the Delhi High Court as well for being ready to take up challenges in this arena.“Our bar is willing to match up to international standards,” Justice Manmohan added.He also mentioned with pride that two Delhi High Judges of the Intellectual Property (IP) division, Justices Jyoti Singh and Amit Bansal, were recently made part of a list of 50 most influential persons in IP..The event also featured a panel discussion on the ‘The Fuzzy Boundaries of Patent Law’ during which Justice Prathiba M Singh observed that patenting is important to identify the originator of an invention, and for incentivising innovation.Senior Advocates CS Vaidyanathan and Chander M Lall also spoke as part of the panel discussion. Vaidyanathan observed that patent examiners need more training. "Unfortunately, I find very often, they (patent examiners) don't even know how to draft an order when some objections are raised," he said. Chander Lall said that India is knowledge-based society and that a large number of patents are for inventions created by Indian inventors.