Image Source: WBNUJS Website
It is with profound sadness that I inform you of the passing of Prof. (Dr.) Pinaki Ghosh, erstwhile WBNUJS IP Chair Professor. Dr. Ghosh, had been at the university since 2019 as its DPIIT IP Chair Professor till 31st March 2026. He died at the age of 61 after a prolonged illness. As reported by his colleagues, during his tenure, nearly 24 Geographical Indication applications were taken forward with his significant involvement at the University. I work at the same University and am a scholar there too. I am also a humble beneficiary of his kind guidance regarding my doctoral thesis in IP litigation.
“Dada, cholo”, (let us go brother), the call would often come without much warning, reminisced Mr. Somjit Dasgupta a 75 year old renowned sarod and rabab player and a compatriot of Dr. Pinaki Ghosh. Dr. Ghosh would suggest a visit somewhere, and by the next morning, he and his friend would be on the road. Sometimes it was to a weavers’ settlement, sometimes to Tarapith in Birbhum, sometimes to Balagarh in Hooghly.
“Pinaki used to say, look, Somjitda, our IPR office work is always there, but if we don’t mix properly with the people, if we don’t look properly at the soil, at how old their work is, how will we understand how our people have survived all these years?” (The discussion with Mr. Somjit Dasgupta took place over a telephonic conversation. I have transcribed, translated, and summarized his heartfelt words)
I interviewed him in 2024 for SpicyIP. I wanted to interview all the chair professors at that time, an idea, fully supported and backed by Swaraj and Praharsh, took a half way flight at that time due to workload reasons. The interview remained unpublished, and returning to it now brings back the curiosity with which he spoke about his work.
Dr. Ghosh described his entry into IP as something that happened relatively late, almost sideways. He had studied mathematics at IIT Kharagpur and completed a PhD in image processing through his work at Jadavpur University and the Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata.
His career had taken him from the missile division of the DRDO in Hyderabad to General Electric’s Medical Systems division. At GE, where he worked from 1997 to 2002 on imaging used to detect disease, he filed 26 patent applications and wrote 20 papers. Towards the end of his time there, he was asked to set up an IP group. He had no legal training then, but took on the task.
He subsequently worked at Infosys, where he began conducting IP audits, and then at Reliance Industries and KPMG. He taught at the National Law School of India University, Bengaluru, and the Rajiv Gandhi School of Intellectual Property Law at IIT Kharagpur, and served on the IP committees of CII, FICCI and ASSOCHAM. Somewhere along this journey, he enrolled for a second PhD, this time in law.
At NUJS, much of his attention turned to GIs. Around two dozen GI applications covered products and crafts such as Janai Manohara, Balagarh boats, Ashapur brinjal, Kolkata jewellery, Purulia lac, Beliatore mecha, Murshidabad silk, Bengal singing bowls, Hatogram shankha craft and Natungram dolls (also find a discussion of all the GI on the WBNUJS website here).
He described a patient process that he undertook. First, he would visit the village where a product was made, and would discuss and work with the artisans towards an agreement to form an association. He would meet the Block Development Officer, the Sub-Divisional Officer and the District Magistrate, and then historians, anthropologists and other academics who would help in establishing the product’s history and provenance. “Malobika, please note the history of a product is indeed important!”
By his own account, he visited more than a hundred places across North and South Bengal. His work also took him to Manipur, Assam, Tripura, Odisha and Jharkhand.
During our talk, he spoke about bell-metal singing bowls made in Bankura. A bowl sold here for around Rs. 500, he said, could fetch as much as Rs. 3,50,000 abroad (sic) (I found one “hand forged in Bankura” selling online for Rs. 7999, see here), where such bowls were marketed for “neuropathy” use (sic). What troubled him was how little the families making them knew about those markets. He wanted better quality certification, marketing support, and GI hubs. He saw the Chau masks of Purulia as a useful example of what targeted GI promotion could achieve. “Look at the Chau masks of Purulia…..GI promotion is helping them.”
The story of Bandel cheese saddened him for similar reasons. When he went looking for its makers, he found that a family had moved from Bandel to Bankura, and that one member was working as a security guard. He welcomed the attention that chefs, such as Ranveer Brar, were bringing to the cheese and put the university’s support behind its GI application. In 2024, he also organised a GI fair/mela.
Partha Chakraborty, Director of the IP Facilitation Centre at WBNUJS, worked with him for several years. He remembers Dr. Ghosh drawing the State Excise Department, as well as enforcement officials in Tripura and Odisha, into discussions about intellectual property. “Sir was a margdarshak” ( “a mentor”), he says. For Mr. Chakraborty, what mattered was the space Dr. Ghosh made for others. Officials, academics, practitioners and research scholars alike. He connects this approach to Swami Vivekananda’s idea of man-making education.
Anindita Bhattacharjee, who joined the DPIIT IPR Chair as a SPRIHA fellow in 2023 and is now a judge at the District Court, Hooghly, West Bengal, remembers accompanying Dr. Ghosh to Balagarh Bijoykrishna Mahavidyalaya in connection with the GI application for the traditional Balagarh boat. “Sir would make sure that I learnt the history of the boats, the lives of the makers, and converse with the boatmen,” she recalls. He wanted the application to reflect the history and dignity of the people who had kept the craft alive.
Dr. Jayanta Ghosh, Assistant Professor at WBNUJS, remembers him in more personal terms. “To me, Pinaki sir was much more than a colleague. He was like an elder brother who guided me, supported me, and taught me so much, both professionally and personally,” he says. “Some relationships go beyond blood, and ours was one such bond.”
Ms. Suhrita Majumdar, of the patent and trade mark attorneys S. Majumdar & Co., recalls calling him with what she thought was a foolish question. “That’s a sign that the curious child in you is still alive. You should never let it die,” he told her. When she later visited him in hospital during chemotherapy, he was tired, but smiling. “We must never give up,” he said. Their conversation returned to how much remained to be done for geographical indications in West Bengal.
Within the university, his willingness to listen was familiar. He supported his own research scholars, and one stray scholar (Me, I was the one).
In our interview, we discussed the abolition of the Intellectual Property Appellate Board and providing expert assistance to the courts in technical patent disputes. Having given expert evidence before the Delhi High Court, he explained that patent disputes were technically complex and courts needed experts to help understand them.
His advice to young IP professionals was practical. Opportunities existed, but they needed to LEARN the skills to do the work. ChatGPT could assist, but not substitute.
There were other projects he hoped to see through. Somjit Dasgupta maintains a collection of more than 300 musical instruments of 33 kinds at his home in Ultadanga, continuing a tradition inherited from his guru, Radhika Mohan Maitra, with whom he lived for eight years. Dr. Ghosh had drawn up plans involving GI protection, a cooperative for instrument-makers in their village in Howrah, and eventually an approach to UNESCO. He prepared the detailed project report himself. Dasgupta recalls a retired ambassador reading it and saying he had rarely encountered a finer report in his professional life.
“He left that work behind and went, left it on my shoulders,” Mr. Dasgupta laments.
I last saw Dr. Ghosh at our Registrar Sir’s office; he looked at me standing at the door, thin but still somewhat strong, “Malobika, chinte parcho?” (Can you remember me?) Malobika could not. Sir said, “Ami Pinaki.” (I am Pinaki). I never met Sir after that.
Death leaves a terrible chasm in us, and the grief, like ash, returns in moments unknown. Death is also unfair. It leaves too much work unfinished. But it also reminds us to cherish every moment of our lives here.
As Swami Vivekananda said, “Nature, body and mind go to death, not we. We neither go nor come.”
You will always be with the IP fraternity, Sir. Goodbye for now.
Thank you to Akriti and Subhodeep Mondal who helped me connect with Dr. Ghosh’s well-wishers. Thank you to SpicyIP for the platform to express my gratitude for Dr. Pinaki Ghosh. I shall be ever grateful. The way they mentor young people (and youngish like me) who are finding their feet in IP is something I have watched closely and admire. I am glad to be part of this.