Summary
Hindustan Unilever Limited ("HUL") sued Kwick Living (I) Private Limited, which sells cleaning products under the Beco brand, before the Delhi High Court over an advertising campaign alleging that HUL’s Surf Excel and Vim contain chemicals that cause skin irritation. The court examined where comparative advertising disparagement begins, holding that disparagement requires both falsity and injury, and that isolated true facts can still combine into a false overall impression. Justice A. J. Bhambhani found that Beco’s campaign, despite relying on genuine test data, conveyed a misleading composite message that crossed the line into actionable disparagement and trademark misuse. The court restrained Beco from continuing the campaign and ordered its removal within a week, while leaving the company free to run lawful comparative advertising going forward. The ruling refines the test courts apply when isolated scientific facts are woven into an advertising narrative implying that a competitor’s product is unsafe.
Background
An advertising campaign that crossed five million views within days, and that accused a market leader’s flagship products of hiding harmful chemicals, has produced one of the year’s sharper rulings on how far comparative advertising disparagement can go before it becomes an actionable wrong.
Hindustan Unilever Limited (“HUL”), which sells the detergent Surf Excel and the dishwashing brand Vim, sued Kwick Living (I) Private Limited (“Kwick Living”), which markets cleaning products under the brand Beco, before the Delhi High Court. HUL alleged that Beco’s “War on What’s Hidden” campaign, launched on 14 August 2026 across YouTube, Instagram, hoardings and over a hundred influencer posts, falsely implied that Surf Excel and Vim cause skin irritation and allergic reactions because they contain Linear Alkylbenzene Sulfonate (“LAS”) and Benzisothiazolinone (“BIT”), while urging consumers to “Switch to BECO.” HUL’s suit, numbered CS(COMM) 904/2026, invoked commercial disparagement, infringement of its registered marks under the Trade Marks Act, 1999 (“Trade Marks Act”), trade dress infringement, and passing off. The suit’s path to a ruling on merits was itself eventful: an earlier order had referred a question of territorial jurisdiction to a Larger Bench, before a Division Bench, in a connected appeal, found the suit prima facie maintainable and remanded the interim injunction application for decision, keeping the jurisdictional reference open.
Issues
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- Whether Beco’s advertising campaign, in its overall effect, amounted to actionable commercial disparagement of Surf Excel and Vim rather than permissible comparative advertising.
- Whether truthful, isolated statements about the presence of LAS and BIT in HUL’s products could still combine into a false or misleading composite message.
- Whether Beco’s use of HUL’s registered trademarks and trade dress in the campaign amounted to infringement under the Trade Marks Act.
- Whether the balance of convenience favoured restraining the entire campaign, or only its objectionable portions, pending trial.
HUL’s Arguments
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- Argued that the campaign used HUL’s registered marks, trade dress and advertising taglines to launch a targeted attack rather than legitimate comparison, citing Reckitt Benckiser (India) (P) Ltd. vs. Hindustan Unilever Ltd. on the limits of permissible comparative advertising.
- Contended that the campaign selectively named only HUL’s products despite similar ingredients existing across the category, and that independent testing showed the disputed ingredients in far lower concentrations than Beco publicised.
- Submitted that the campaign’s cumulative message, portraying consumers who continued using Surf Excel and Vim as foolish or uninformed, amounted to calculated disparagement disguised as public interest.
- Relied on the balance-of-convenience principles from TV Today Network Ltd. vs. News Laundry Media (P) Ltd. & Ors. to argue that ongoing reputational harm outweighed any prejudice to Beco from an injunction.
Beco’s Arguments
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- Argued that comparative advertising permits naming a competitor’s product and referencing its trademark to the extent necessary for identification, relying on Dabur India Ltd. vs. Colortek Meghalaya (P) Ltd.
- Submitted that every claim in the campaign was ingredient-specific, tied to NABL-accredited laboratory testing, and framed only as a capability (“can cause”) rather than an assertion of actual harm.
- Contended that truth is a complete defence to disparagement, invoking the principle in Bonnard vs. Perryman that courts are reluctant to restrain speech a defendant credibly claims is true.
- Argued that, at most, only specific representations should be restrained rather than the campaign as a whole, relying on Puro Wellness (P) Ltd. vs. Tata Chemicals Ltd.
Court’s Analysis
Disparagement Requires More Than An Unflattering Comparison
The court observed that comparative advertising disparagement is often used loosely to describe any statement casting a rival’s product in an unfavourable light, but that this is not how the wrong is properly understood in law. The court noted that disparagement, properly defined, requires two conjunctive elements: a statement that is false, and a statement that causes injury. The court reasoned that a mere derogatory comparison, without more, does not become actionable simply because a competitor regards it as unflattering, since some degree of adverse comparison is inherent in any comparative advertisement. The court held that the line lies between legitimate comparison or puffery on one hand, and false, misleading, or deceptive representation on the other, and that only the latter attracts legal intervention.
The Whole Can Mislead Even When The Parts Are True
The court observed that it could not, at the interim stage, adjudicate the competing laboratory reports filed by the parties on the concentration of LAS and BIT, since that exercise required expert evidence at trial. The court found that even accepting that BIT and LAS could, on a standalone and isolated basis, cause skin irritation in a particular user, Beco’s campaign did not present these facts in isolation. The court noted that the campaign juxtaposed the chemical claims with visual depictions of HUL’s products and an invitation to switch brands, and that the unmistakable overall message conveyed to an average consumer was that using Surf Excel and Vim would cause skin irritation. The court reasoned that an average consumer would not deconstruct or scientifically analyse the campaign’s individual claims, making the composite impression the operative test in this comparative advertising disparagement dispute rather than the literal accuracy of any single statement.
Trademark Use In A Disparaging Campaign Loses Its Shelter
The court opined that Beco’s repeated display of HUL’s registered marks, distinctive packaging, and advertising expressions, combined with health-related insinuations and an explicit call to switch brands, went beyond identifying a comparator and instead demonstrated a premeditated competitive attack. The court stated that comparative advertising disparagement claims typically fail when a defendant’s message stays within genuine puffery, but that Beco’s campaign, by citing complex chemical names, proportions and percentages to manufacture a sense of scientific certitude, crossed the permissible contours of comparative advertising under the Trade Marks Act. The court further observed that the campaign’s timing and Beco’s continued amplification after HUL’s cease-and-desist notice reinforced the inference of a deliberate commercial attack rather than a bona fide transparency exercise.
Findings
In view of the observations and the arguments presented by both the parties, the Delhi High Court held that:
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- Held that Hindustan Unilever Limited had made out a prima facie case of commercial disparagement and trademark infringement against Beco’s “War on What’s Hidden” campaign.
- Held that the balance of convenience favoured Hindustan Unilever Limited, and that irreparable harm would follow if the campaign continued unchecked.
- Directed Kwick Living (I) Private Limited to pull down, remove, and recall all advertisements forming part of the impugned campaign within one week, across every format and medium.
- Directed Kwick Living to file an affidavit of compliance within one week of the removal deadline.
- Clarified that the restraint applied only to the impugned campaign and did not bar Beco from running lawful comparative advertising against HUL’s products in future.
Case Citation
Hindustan Unilever Limited vs Kwick Living (I) Private Limited, CS(COMM) 904/2026, Delhi High Court, decided on 10 September 2026. Available at https://indiankanoon.org/doc/152557360/.
Authored by Gaurav Mishra, IP Attorney, BananaIP Counsels