Aswal Associates

The 2024 amendment to Form 27 changed more than the deadline. Most patentees I speak to still expect the old annual filing.

Here's what actually changed under the Patents (Amendment) Rules, 2024:

📌 Triennial filing — once every three financial years instead of annually.
📌 Window opens 1 April after the block closes and shuts 30 September.
📌 Working details slimmed down — only confirmation of working is required now, with no figures on quantum, value, or imports.
📌 Prospective application only — annual filings missed before March 2024 cannot be clubbed into the new three-year block. This catches a lot of people.
📌 No condonation — Rule 137(2) expressly excludes Form 27 from delay relief, unlike most other patent timelines.

For most Indian patents granted before FY 2023-24, the first consolidated deadline under the new regime falls on 30 September 2026.

If you hold an Indian patent — or several — it's worth doing a single audit this quarter: which three-year block does each patent fall into, and is there a gap between the last working statement and today.

I've published a full practitioner's guide covering the legal framework, deadlines by category, penalty exposure, and the new disclosure requirements. Link in comments.

Beach road then and now