Protection of Traditional Knowledge and Biopiracy in India: A Study

Abstract

In the era of globalisation, protection of IPR is mandatory. Traditional knowledge is held collectively by a community and might include songs, stories, proverbs, folklore, beliefs, rituals, regional languages, local laws, and more. In addition, it can take a practical form in a variety of industries, including forestry, fishing, agriculture, horticulture, and environmental management. The preservation of traditional knowledge was long neglected. We are surrounded by it, yet we have devalued and degraded its importance. Traditional knowledge can now be protected by Intellectual property rights, however it is a difficult process. One of the most crucial difficulties facing the region today is the protection, conservation, and preservation of traditional knowledge as well as the assistance of local people for the commercialization of their products. India has achieved notable success in the last two years by ensuring the withdrawal or cancellation of 36 patent applications for widely recognized medical compositions, specifically in Europe. This achievement can be attributed to the Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL), a unique database containing a vast amount of information with approximately 34 million pages. The TKDL focuses on around 2,260,000 (0.226 million) pharmaceutical formulations, encompassing multiple languages. Its primary purpose is to support patent examiners from prominent intellectual property (IP) offices by facilitating prior art searches.2 The Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) overcomes the language barrier that exists between the traditional knowledge expressed in languages commonly used by patent examiners in leading intellectual property (IP) offices and languages such as Sanskrit, Arabic, Persian, Urdu, and Tamil. The TKDL organises its data in a manner similar to a patent application.