India: Market Insights

Fashion law in India: Coming of age

A key fashion market

The Patiala Necklace, created by Cartier in 1928 for the Maharaja of Patiala, was part of the largest commission in the house’s history (EUR 2.2 billion adjusted value in 2023) and emblematic of the patronage Indian royal courts extended to Europe’s leading fashion houses. When music superstar Diljit Dosanjh appeared on the Met Gala 2025 red carpet dressed in a Prabal Gurung sherwani (long, structured coat-like garment) and jewels inspired by the Patiala Necklace, he looked a modern maharaja. He presented Indian fashion not through the lens of Western design, but as an identity with its own deep sartorial grammar and one that could confidently hold the global spotlight. In fact, his look was voted as the top look of the night by readers of Vogue magazine.

In recent years, India’s voice in global fashion has unmistakably grown stronger. Prominent examples include a snakes-and-ladders board designed by Indian architect Bijoy Jain as the set for Louis Vuitton’s Men’s Spring-Summer 2026 show; a Gucci saree on the 78th Cannes Film Festival red carpet; Kerala’s artisanal carpets underfoot at the Met Gala; and Indian designers Gaurav Gupta and Rahul Mishra as regulars on the official Paris Haute Couture calendar. Alongside this, Indian celebrities are framing luxury narratives as ambassadors — Deepika Padukone for Louis Vuitton, Priyanka Chopra for Bvlgari, Alia Bhatt for Gucci, and Ananya Panday for Chanel.

According to the BoF-McKinsey ‘State Of Fashion 2025’ report, more than 67% of global fashion executives see India as one of the top three emerging markets for the next five years. 

Also capturing the momentum is the fact that before the pandemic India saw around 12 global brand entries annually. That figure rose to 14 in 2023, 27 in 2024, and 30 international brands, heavily focused on fashion, beauty and lifestyle, in 2025. And, although the last couple of years have been muted for the global luxury market, the Indian fashion market was forecast to grow between 12–17% in 2025, positioning it as one of the most compelling growth stories.

As artisans, designers, brands and cultural icons participating in India’s fashion trajectory move into full view, issues of ownership, attribution and protection no longer remain incidental. India, therefore, is not only at a creative inflection point - when it comes to issues of fashion, it is also at a legal one.

Court and couture

Couture may be protected in India through registration as a design under the Designs Act, 2000. Unlike Europe, no unregistered design rights are available (though an amendment is contemplated). However, section 15(2) of the Copyright Act, 1957 preserves copyright in an unregistered design so long as it is not industrially produced beyond the statutory threshold of 50 reproductions. Section 15(2) has been asserted by designers to block counterfeiters in the absence of a design registration, but many a time it has been ruled that since they had crossed the 50 reproductions mark, a remedy under copyright law was unavailable (Ritika Pvt. Ltd. v. Biba Apparels, 2016).

Things have changed in recent days on two counts. One, design registrations are becoming popular. Famed Indian couturier Sabyasachi was the highest filer of design applications in the country between 2023 and 2025. Second, whilst determining the applicability of section 15(2), the focus has shifted from the 50 reproductions threshold to whether or not the reproductions were made through an ‘industrial process’.

For instance, New Delhi based designer Rahul Mishra’s label is recognised for its luxurious handcrafted designs. In October 2024, after discovering a rogue website, www.rahudress.com, selling replicas of his couture designs using images lifted from his official site and runway shows, he filed a suit before the Delhi High Court alleging trademark and copyright infringement, design piracy, passing off and unfair competition. Engaging with section 15(2), the court held that couture creations fell squarely within this exception as the garments in question were handcrafted, produced in highly limited numbers, allowing copyright to subsist in the design despite lack of statutory design registration. The court accordingly granted the injunction.

Another celebrated Indian couturier Gaurav Gupta, internationally recognised for his sculptural silhouettes worn by celebrities such as Beyonce and Cardi B, instituted a series of successful enforcement actions before the Delhi High Court in 2023–2025. He too moved against entities selling exact replicas online, often using photographs lifted directly from his runway shows and official platforms to falsely suggest authenticity. He alleged copyright infringement in both the runway images and the garments themselves, along with passing off and unfair competition. Placing reliance on section 15(2), he argued that the limited, bespoke production of his garments was well below the threshold of industrial reproduction and hence, preserved copyright protection over their distinctive sculptural form, silhouette and surface ornamentation. The court granted ex-parte interim injunctions and recognised the artistic and non-mass-produced nature of couture.

The Rahul Mishra litigation was also noteworthy as the John Doe interim injunction granted in his case was a ‘dynamic’ injunction. This is a remedy introduced in 2019 to combat online copyright piracy as it allows for real-time blocking of mirror or alphanumeric websites that emerge after a lawsuit is filed, preventing the need for new suits against each new infringing site.

In the context of online marketplaces, 2024 saw designer Masaba Gupta approach the Delhi High Court after discovering multiple Instagram pages using handles such as “masabacoutureofficial.co” and other deceptively similar variants incorporating her proprietary marks MASABA and HOUSE OF MASABA. The court granted interim injunctive relief and restrained use of the impugned marks as social-media identifiers — recognising Instagram handles are key indicators of authenticity — whilst also directing platform-level action to disable or suspend the infringing accounts.

The luxury of being well-known

The Birkin Bag is fashion royalty and in November 2025, the Delhi High Court declared the three-dimensional shape of the Hermès Birkin handbag, the HERMÈS word mark and two stylised marks to be well-known trademarks in India. Applying the statutory criteria, the court assessed recognition among the relevant Indian public (including exclusive boutiques in Delhi and Mumbai), duration and extent of use, scale of promotion, cross-jurisdictional registrations and industry acknowledgement, and held that Hermès met the heightened threshold. It further recognised that the Hermès brand functions as a source identifier independent of any single product category.

The ruling reflects the multi-segment operations of modern fashion houses — Hermès across leather goods, apparel, jewellery, fragrances and homeware, with peers such as LVMH, Dior and Gucci extending into hospitality, beauty and lifestyle — and underscores the role of the well-known mark doctrine in enabling cross-class protection, reducing the burden of proving confusion and preventing dilution. In the Indian market, where luxury brands often face high awareness but limited physical presence, such recognition can be a critical enforcement tool.

When fashion meets heritage

Meanwhile, there is also increased conversation around Geographical Indications (GI) in India. A GI is a sign used to inform consumers about a product’s specific geographical origin and a unique quality, characteristic or reputation linked to its place of origin. Statutory protection is available under the Geographical Indications of Goods Act, 1999 and it is important as unauthorised use leads consumers buying an imitation to believe they are buying a genuine product with specific characteristics. If such use is left unchecked, producers suffer as valuable business is taken away from them, and, over time, a GI’s value begins to diminish and, eventually, is lost altogether.

Kolhapuri Chappal is a registered GI in India and when Prada’s toe-ring sandals in its spring 2026 menswear show invited instant comparisons, the conversation soon travelled to the courtroom — a public interest litigation was filed before the Bombay High Court. The case against Prada was dismissed but it drew attention to India’s many GI protected heritage crafts. More importantly, Prada’s response offered a nuanced lesson for fashion brands. Upon recognising the GI concerns raised, the brand publicly acknowledged the inspiration drawn from Kolhapuri footwear and moved swiftly to engage with Indian artisan groups, announcing plans for a limited-edition collaboration mixing traditional Indian skills with Italian manufacturing techniques. Prada chose dialogue, attribution and participation — demonstrating how global businesses can respond responsibly when operating in culturally complex design environments.

The road ahead

Against the backdrop of the recently announced India–EU Free Trade Agreement (FTA), the issues discussed above assume heightened importance. Key sectors — including textiles, apparel, leather, footwear, toys, gems and jewellery — currently subject to import duties ranging from 4% to 26%, are expected to move to zero duty, materially improving India’s competitiveness in the EU market. This shift is particularly significant when read alongside two structural realities: a 2021 European Commission study found that GI-protected products command, on average, twice the sales value of comparable non-certified goods; and India remains a cornerstone of global fashion manufacturing (for instance, it accounts for over 95% of the world’s embroidery work). As tariff barriers fall and value increasingly attaches to origin, authenticity and craft, IP protection — including GIs, which are being addressed under a dedicated agreement of the India-EU FTA — is likely to move decisively to centre stage.

Taken together, trends suggest that India is not merely becoming a bigger fashion market, it is also refining the legal grammar through which fashion operates.