Traditionally rich India today offered to share its experiences in protecting traditional knowledge from being used to get patents with countries desirous of doing so. “I assure you that the Government would extend all co-operation to you, in particular to WIPO, so that countries rich in traditional knowledge and biodiversity and desirous of adopting TKDL as a model to protect such knowledge are able to do so,” Science and Technology Minister P K Bansal said. He made these remarks at an international conference ‘Utilisation of the Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) as a Model for the Protection of Traditional Knowledge’ here. India is the only country in the world to have set up an institutional mechanism — Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) — to protect its traditional knowledge and to prevent grant of wrong patents. The TKDL database includes 54 authoritative textbooks on ayurvedic medicine, nearly 1,50,000 ayurvedic, unani and siddha medicines, and over 1,500 physical exercises and postures in yoga. TKDL is being used as a ready reckoner by patent examiners to compare patent applications with existing traditional knowledge. “Today, because of TKDL, India is well equipped to protect 2,26,000 formulations within a time range of days and weeks and without any cost,” Bansal said.
Source : IBN live
