Intellectual Property Right (IPR)

Intellectual Property Right (IPR) is a legal category of property covering intangible creations of the human intellect - it primarily consists of copyrights, patents and trademarks, but also extends to related protections such as trade secrets, publicity rights, moral rights and rights against unfair competition. In the specific context of biotechnology, any transformed microorganism or plant, and any technology developed for the commercial production of a product from it, is treated as the exclusive property of whoever discovered or developed it. That discoverer holds the full rights over their property, and those rights cannot be exercised or exploited by anyone else without legal permission; a country's own laws are what protect and enforce this right on the discoverer's behalf. In India specifically, IPR is protected through several distinct instruments, s …