Trademark Opposition in India: The Complete Timeline

Opposition is a different process from objection, even though the two get used interchangeably in conversation. An objection comes from the Registrar during examination. An opposition comes from a third party — a competitor, a prior user, or, under Section 21 of the Trade Marks Act, 1999, literally any member of the public — after your mark has already cleared examination and been published. It's a separate battle, with its own deadlines, its own evidence process, and its own path to appeal.

Objection vs. Opposition — Not the Same Thing

An examination objection is raised by the Registrar based on absolute grounds (the mark itself is descriptive or lacks distinctiveness) or relative grounds (conflict with an existing mark), and you reply directly to the Registry. We've covered how to prepare a stronger objection reply separately — that process happens earlier, before publication.

Opposition happens after your mark has cleared examination and been accepted for publication. At that point, the door opens for outside parties to challenge it, and "any person" genuinely means any person — Indian courts have held that an opponent doesn't need to be a registered trademark owner, or even have a direct commercial stake, to file one.

The Trademark Journal: Where Opposition Starts

The Trademark Journal is published weekly by the Trade Marks Registry, listing every mark that has cleared examination and is now open for opposition. This publication date is what starts the clock — the four-month opposition window runs from the date of publication (or re-publication, if the mark was corrected and republished), not from your original filing date.

This is also why monitoring matters, in both directions. If you're the applicant, missing an opposition against your own mark isn't something you monitor for — the Registry notifies you. But if you're watching for conflicts with your own existing mark, you need to actively check the Journal or use a monitoring tool, since nothing alerts you automatically to a new, similar mark being published. Our guide on how trademark search actually works covers the same database this draws from.

The Full Opposition Timeline

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The Evidence Stages, in Plain Terms

Once a Counter-Statement is filed, the opposition moves into what's effectively a documentary trial, governed by Rules 45, 46, and 47 of the Trade Marks Rules, 2017:

• Rule 45 — Evidence in support of opposition: the opponent has two months from receiving the Counter-Statement to file affidavit evidence — invoices, advertising material, sales figures, anything supporting the claims in the Notice of Opposition. The opponent can also formally waive this stage and rely only on the Notice itself.
• Rule 46 — Evidence in support of the application: the applicant then has two months to respond in kind, filing evidence supporting their own registration, or similarly waiving the stage.
• Rule 47 — Evidence in reply: the opponent gets one final month to file evidence strictly in rebuttal to the applicant's evidence. This step is optional and can't introduce new grounds — it can only respond to what the applicant filed under Rule 46.

If a party fails to act within their evidence window and hasn't filed a formal waiver, the usual consequence is that their case is treated as resting solely on their written pleadings — a materially weaker position than one backed by affidavit evidence.

Hearing, Decision, and Appeal

Once all evidence stages conclude, the Registrar schedules a hearing and notifies both parties. Either side can request an adjournment using Form TM-M, at least three days before the hearing date, for a ₹900 fee — though no party gets more than two adjournments, and each is capped at 30 days.

After hearing both sides and reviewing the evidence, the Registrar issues a decision: the opposition may be dismissed (application proceeds to registration), the application may be refused entirely, or it may be partially accepted — for instance, by narrowing the goods or services the registration covers.

Opposition Costs

The government fees involved are modest compared to what a fully contested opposition can cost once professional representation, evidence preparation, and hearing appearances are factored in:

• Notice of Opposition (Form TM-O): ₹2,700 per class for e-filing, ₹3,000 per class for physical filing — paid by the opponent.
• Counter-Statement: ₹2,700 per class — paid by the applicant.
• Hearing adjournment (Form TM-M): ₹900, if requested.

We've covered these figures, alongside the rest of the government fee structure, in more detail in our full cost breakdown. What isn't reflected in the government fee schedule is the time and professional cost of preparing evidence and appearing across multiple stages over what can be a multi-year process — worth factoring in before deciding whether to file or defend an opposition.