The two Lodha brothers, Abhishek Lodha of Macrotech Developers and his brother Abhinandan Lodha of House of Abhinandan Lodha, are slugging it out in court over the use of the ‘Lodha’ name. On Monday, they were advised by the Bombay High Court to seek mediation.
“We will go by the advice of the Hon’ble Bombay High Court,” said a spokesperson for Lodha Ventures, controlled by Abhinandan Lodha.
The next hearing on the matter is fixed for Tuesday, January 28, for Abhishek’s counsel Janak Dwarkadas to revert if Abhishek is willing to pursue mediation.
The dispute
Last week, Macrotech Developers, controlled by Abhishek filed a ₹5,000 crore trademark dispute case against the House of Abhinandan Lodha (HoAL), seeking an order restraining his brother’s company from using the ‘Lodha’ name in any form.
According to Macrotech Developers, use of the brand name by the rival faction had created confusion in the minds of customers. “Lodha’s brand has been built with lots of investment and effort over 40 years. It is critical for the company to protect its IPR and ensure that no other developer creates confusion of being similar to or same as our brand,” a spokesperson for the group said.
The Lodha group, established in 1980 by Mangal Prabhat Lodha, saw tensions arise between his two sons from 2008 to 2015, that finally led to a split. In 2017, the two brothers formally split, and under its terms Abhishek was left with the business, while Abhinandan opted to take the payout and set up his own business. There was also a non-compete clause, which the Abhinandan faction claims was in operation from 2017 to 2022 and was limited to two locations, Mumbai, and London.
According to Macrotech Developers, between 2015 and 2020, Abhishek Lodha and his family went through a ‘near death experience’ due to the baggage of ₹20,000-crore debt he was saddled with.
One of the main contentions of Macrotech in its lawsuit is that, HoAL has been using the Lodha trademark rampantly, “from applying for similar trademarks with the registry, to bidding for ‘Lodha’ on Google, to releasing advertisements with the trademark,” effectively trying to portray it as the ‘Lodha Group’.
The lawsuit also states that the 2017 family agreement was repudiated by Abhinandan, and a second one was drawn up in 2023 in which it was agreed that Abhinandan “would not use any name which is similar to or leads with Lodha, including ‘ Lodha Ventures’. The application stated that Abhishek “agreed to not object to Abhinandan’s use of ‘House of Abhinandan Lodha’ for his business.
Meanwhile, HoAL told businessline that the lawsuit by Macrotech Developers “came as a surprise” as Abhinandan Lodha continued to believe that family matters should not be settled in public.
The spokesperson also made it clear that HoAL was in plotted development and the product was different from what Macrotech developed. “We are largely not present in the locations where their projects are on offer.”
Macrotech is present across the spectrum of residences right from middle-income to luxury. Its Lodha Malabar in Mumbai has spacious apartments starting from ₹50 crore and are sold at rates well over ₹1 lakh per square feet.
What the HC said
At the hearing today, Justice Arif Doctor observing that the dispute appeared to be originating from the two brothers, queried if any genuine effort had been made to resolve the dispute.
Justice Doctor also suggested that a retired Chief Justice of India, along with another senior member should be appointed for mediation, that would be time bound and not more than two weeks.
Macrotech counsel Darius Khambata and Abhishek’s lawyer Janak Dwarkadas both told the court said that they were not against mediation, but HoAL and related entities should stop using the trademark till mediation is pending.