Okhla, Gandhi Nagar and Noida export houses ship containers of clothing to the US, EU and UK every season — but too often under a label that nobody owns anywhere.
The garment corridor from Okhla Industrial Area through Gandhi Nagar to the Noida apparel-export hub runs on labels — the woven tag inside the collar, the hangtag on the buyer's rack, the neck print on a private-label order. Yet a striking number of export houses ship season after season under a brand that is registered in no country at all, not even India. That is a gap a competitor, or worse, an overseas buyer, can walk straight through.
An apparel exporter's core protection sits in Class 25 (clothing, footwear, headgear) plus Class 35 (retail, wholesale and export trading services). Because India follows first-to-file, the first step is a proper trademark search across Class 25 followed by an application on Form TM-A. Houses across Delhi and Noida file through the Delhi Registry at Dwarka, though the filing itself is online and all-India.
The bigger exposure is abroad: an Indian registration does nothing in New York, Paris or London. If your label sells there, you need the Madrid Protocol route to extend protection into those markets before someone else claims it.
Three filings cover most of the IP risk on day one. Each is a standalone service and each links to a deeper walkthrough.
Class 25 covers the goods themselves — shirts, trousers, kidswear, knitwear, footwear and headgear. This is non-negotiable for any garment house. Class 35 covers the trading, wholesale and export-agency side: if you also run a showroom, a webstore or take buying-house orders on behalf of others, Class 35 protects the name in that commercial role. Many Okhla and Gandhi Nagar exporters file both from day one because the same label appears on the tag and on the invoice.
Use the class finder to confirm the goods and services you actually ship, then estimate the outlay with the cost calculator — two classes on the MSME rate is ₹9,000 in government fees plus professional charges. Do a thorough pre-filing search first; Class 25 is one of the most crowded registers in India, and a near-identical mark for apparel will draw a Section 11 objection.
If your competitive edge is a distinctive print, weave or garment silhouette rather than the name, protect that separately as a registered design, and protect original artwork on your prints and lookbooks through copyright registration. A woven-tag typeface, an embroidered monogram or a signature hangtag layout is often more distinctive than the plain word, so filing the logo as a device mark alongside the wordmark gives you a second, sturdier line of defence at examination and in any later dispute.
One practical sequencing point for seasonal businesses: file before you commission the bulk woven tags and neck prints for a season, not after. A garment house that prints fifty thousand labels and then hits a Section 11 objection has to choose between an expensive rebrand mid-season or trading on a mark it may never own. A week spent on a clearance search ahead of the tag order is the cheapest insurance in the whole supply chain. If an objection does arrive, a reasoned objection reply can still carry the mark through where the conflict is narrow.
This is the single most expensive lesson in the export trade. A Gandhi Nagar house registers its brand in India, ships two seasons to a European retailer, and then discovers the retailer — or a rival supplier — has quietly registered that exact label in the EU. Suddenly the Indian exporter cannot sell its own brand into the market it built. Trademark rights are territorial: the Indian certificate stops at the Indian border.
The efficient fix is the Madrid Protocol. On one international application filed through the Indian Registry (with your Indian mark as the base), you can designate the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom, the UAE and dozens of other buyer countries. It is far cheaper and faster than hiring separate attorneys in each country. Our Madrid Protocol guide for Delhi NCR walks through the base-application requirement, the fee structure and the country-by-country timelines.
Time the international filing early — ideally the season before you enter a market, not after a distributor has started ordering. The moment a buyer sees volume, the incentive for someone to grab the mark rises. The Madrid route also has a quiet dependency worth knowing: for the first five years the international registration is tied to your Indian base mark, so if the Indian application is weak and gets refused, the international designations can fall with it. That is one more reason the Indian filing must be clean and properly searched before the international layer is built on top of it.
Most Delhi export houses run two very different books. On private-label orders you manufacture to a buyer's brand — the buyer owns that mark, and you should never file it. On own-brand orders you sell under your label, and that is the asset worth protecting in India and abroad. Confusing the two is where disputes start. Spell out, in a written manufacturing and supply agreement, that private-label IP stays with the buyer while your own house brand stays with you.
When you appoint an overseas distributor or agent, put the trademark ownership in writing before the first shipment. A distributor who registers ‘your’ mark in their home country under their own name is a recurring nightmare; a properly drafted licensing or distribution agreement keeps ownership with you and grants only a limited, revocable right to use the mark, with the mark reverting to you when the relationship ends. Read how ownership plays out for the wider export ecosystem in our note on Delhi handicraft exporters and textile wholesalers.
There is a middle case that catches Gandhi Nagar houses in particular: the ‘house label’ that started life as a private-label make and slowly became your own retail line. If you built goodwill in that name, file it — but check first that the original buyer did not already register it. The cleanest position is to keep a simple register of which names are yours, which are buyers’, and which are shared, and to review it every season. When you and a manufacturing partner co-develop a sub-brand, decide ownership up front in the supply contract; retrofitting ownership after a name takes off is where money and goodwill both leak.
India is first-to-file, and so is most of the world. An Okhla exporter who ships to the UK under an unregistered label has no standing to stop a buyer or rival from registering it there — and reclaiming it later means an opposition or cancellation abroad that costs many times what a timely Madrid filing would have.
Once the mark is filed, put a watch on the Trade Marks Journal so a copycat apparel filing is caught during the four-month opposition window rather than after it registers. If a lookalike does slip through, you can move to oppose it or, later, act through infringement litigation. Marks renew every ten years on Form TM-R — see renewal — and if the family business splits or you sell a brand, record the transfer properly via assignment on Form TM-P.
For a fuller Delhi playbook, the Okhla garment exporters guide and the complete 2026 Delhi guide cover documents, timelines and fees, while the Delhi city hub explains the Dwarka Registry's jurisdiction. Before a big buyer audit or an investment round, an IP audit confirms the brand is registered in every market you actually sell in.
Set expectations realistically. From filing on Form TM-A, an uncontested Class 25 application typically takes about 18 to 24 months to registration — examination in a few months, publication in the Trade Marks Journal, a four-month opposition window, then registration. The good news is that legal protection and the right to use the ™ symbol begin from the filing date, not the registration date, so a garment house is protected from the day it applies. You can follow the file at each stage on the IP India portal.
The paperwork is light: the applicant’s name and address, a clear representation of the mark, the list of goods, a signed TM-48 power of attorney authorising your agent, and — to unlock the concessional fee — the Udyam (MSME) registration certificate. Most Okhla and Gandhi Nagar exporters qualify as MSMEs, which is what brings the government fee down to ₹4,500 per class on e-filing instead of ₹9,000. Get the Udyam certificate in place before filing, because the concession is applied at the point of filing, not retrospectively. The handicraft exporters playbook and the wider Noida hub cover the same fee mechanics for cross-border sellers.
Shipping your own label to the US, EU or UK? Register in India, then Madrid-file into your buyer countries before a distributor beats you to it.
WhatsApp our team →Clothing, footwear and headgear sit in Class 25. If you also run wholesale, retail or export-trading services under the same name, add Class 35. Most Delhi export houses file both — start with a Class 25 search because it is a very crowded register.
No. Trademark rights are territorial, so an Indian registration stops at the Indian border. To protect your label in buyer countries you must register there — most efficiently through the Madrid Protocol, which lets you designate the US, EU and UK on one application.
This is a common and painful pattern. Because most countries are first-to-file, an unregistered exporter has weak standing abroad. The fix is to register your mark internationally early and to lock trademark ownership into a written distribution agreement before the first shipment leaves Okhla.
The buyer owns their private-label brand — you should never file it. Your own house brand is yours to register in India and abroad. Put it in writing: a manufacturing and supply agreement should state clearly which IP belongs to whom.
Filing is online and all-India, though Noida applicants fall under the Delhi Registry at Dwarka. Government fees are ₹4,500 per class on the MSME/startup rate — Class 25 plus Class 35 is ₹9,000 plus professional charges. Estimate the full outlay with the cost calculator.