Section 32 of the Patents Act, 1970
Anticipation by public working
Section 32 allows public trial working of an invention in India in the year before the priority date without it counting as anticipation.
Official legal text
The verbatim statutory text of this provision is reproduced from the official source and checked by our legal reviewer before it is published here. Until that check is complete for this page, read the exact wording directly from the official source linked below — it is the only version that governs.
Treat this page as a guide. The provision as officially published, along with the Gazette notifications that apply to it, remains the governing text and overrides any simplification here.
What this section says, in plain language
Some inventions cannot be tested behind closed doors. A road resurfacing machine has to run on a road. A canal gate has to be fitted to a canal. A rooftop mounting system has to sit on a roof through a monsoon. If every such trial destroyed novelty, inventors would be forced to choose between proving that a machine works and being able to patent it.
Section 32 removes that choice in a controlled way. The invention is not treated as anticipated by reason only of it having been publicly worked in India, if four things are true together. The working happened within one year before the priority date. It was done by the applicant, or by a person from whom the applicant derives title, or by another person with their consent. It was for the purpose of reasonable trial only. And it was reasonably necessary, given the nature of the invention, that the working be done in public.
The words reasonable trial only carry the weight. A trial is about learning whether the invention works, how it behaves and what needs changing. Once the activity turns into revenue, it stops being a trial. Selling the output, charging for the service, taking orders on the strength of the demonstration or running the machine as part of normal commercial operations all point away from trial and towards commercial working, which section 32 does not save.
The word only matters too. The section protects the working itself. If the trial was accompanied by a brochure, a public technical presentation or a press article describing how the invention is built, that is a separate publication and has to be assessed on its own footing, usually under section 29 or section 31.
As with the other anticipation exceptions, evidence decides the outcome. A written trial protocol setting out the purpose, a dated agreement with the site owner, an explanation of why an indoor test was not possible, records of who attended and what they were told, and confidentiality terms wherever they were practical all help. The applicant or patentee has to prove the position, and reconstructing it years later in an opposition is far harder than recording it at the time.
Why this section matters
Makers of machinery, civil and agricultural equipment, infrastructure products and field devices that can only be tested realistically in an open, public setting.
It matters when planning a field trial, and again when a prior use objection is raised during examination, opposition or revocation.
It creates a one-year shelter for genuine public trials in India, so that a necessary field test is not treated as anticipation of the invention.
The field trial becomes prior use, the claims can be refused for lack of novelty, and a granted patent is exposed to revocation on the same facts.
How it works in practice
A pothole repair machine tested on a municipal road
Shilpa Deshmukh runs a road equipment workshop in Nashik and builds a machine that fills and compacts potholes in a single pass. The machine cannot be assessed on a workshop floor because its value lies in how it handles real road surfaces, traffic vibration and monsoon damage. In August she signs a written trial agreement with a municipal ward office allowing three test runs on a stretch of public road, purely for evaluation and with no payment either way. She records the purpose, the dates, the observers present and the changes made after each run. She files her patent application the following March, seven months later. During post-grant opposition an opponent argues that the machine was publicly worked before the priority date. Shilpa relies on section 32, produces the trial agreement, the log sheets and evidence that no revenue was earned, and shows that a public road trial was unavoidable for a machine of this kind.
Simplified illustration only. Actual legal outcomes depend on the facts.
Key points to remember
- The public working must fall inside the one year immediately before the priority date.
- It must be done by the applicant, a predecessor in title, or another person with their consent.
- The purpose must be reasonable trial only, not commercial exploitation.
- Public working must have been reasonably necessary because of the nature of the invention.
- The protection covers the working itself; any accompanying publication is judged separately.
Common mistakes and misunderstandings
- Treating a paid pilot as a trial. Taking money, running the machine commercially or accepting orders during the test moves the activity outside section 32.
- Assuming the year is a general grace period. It applies only to public working for reasonable trial in India, not to sales, brochures or presentations.
- Running the trial without paperwork. Without a dated trial protocol and a reason why public testing was necessary, the defence is very hard to prove later.
Connected provisions
- ActSection 29Anticipation by previous publication
- ActSection 31Anticipation by public display, etc.
- ActSection 34No anticipation if circumstances are only as described in sections 29, 30, 31 and 32
- ActSection 13Search for anticipation by previous publication and by prior claim
- ActSection 64Revocation of patents
The rules connected to a section are listed on their own because they are subordinate legislation. They cannot go beyond the Act, but they can be changed by notification without a new statute, so seeing them separately makes it easier to check whether the current procedure is still what you remember.
Forms, deadlines and fees
- The public trial working must have taken place within one year before the priority date of the claim.
- Trial working earlier than that one-year window is ordinary prior use and section 32 does not save it.
Open the deadline calculator — and have every date confirmed against the current Rules before you rely on it.
Any official fee connected with this provision is fixed by the First Schedule to the Patents Rules, not by the provision itself. The amount depends on who the applicant is and on whether the filing is made online or on paper, so no figures are reproduced here. How Indian patent fees work.
Related judgments
Case law is added slowly and deliberately. A summary is drafted, checked against the reported judgment and then reviewed before publication, because a wrong case note can mislead a reader badly. No summary for this provision has reached publication yet. How case notes are prepared.
Questions people ask about Section 32
What counts as reasonable trial rather than commercial use?
The test is purpose and scale. A reasonable trial is aimed at finding out whether the invention performs as expected under real conditions, and it usually shows features such as a limited duration, a defined test plan, observation records and design changes made in response. Commercial use shows the opposite features: revenue, ordinary production runs, marketing built on the demonstration and continued operation after the technical questions are answered. There is no fixed line, so the honest description of the activity in contemporaneous records matters a great deal.
Does section 32 apply to trials done outside India?
The section is worded around working in India. Trials done abroad are not covered by it, and they will be judged under the ordinary rules on prior use and disclosure, both in India and in the country concerned. If a field trial has to happen abroad, the practical answer is to file a provisional or complete specification in India first, so that a priority date exists before the trial begins. Section 39 also has to be kept in mind before any foreign filing is made.
Can I do a public trial after filing instead?
That is usually the better course. Once an application with a provisional or complete specification is on file, the priority date is fixed and later use or publication of what the specification describes is dealt with by section 33 for the period between the provisional and the complete specification. It also puts you in a stronger position abroad, since most foreign systems give no relief for pre-filing public trials. Section 32 is best treated as a rescue for trials that could not be delayed.
Planning a public field trial before you file?
MYCrave Consultancy helps you structure and document the trial, or file first, so a necessary test never becomes a novelty objection.
You will be speaking with MYCrave Consultancy & Services, the firm that operates this platform. General questions are answered free; matter‑specific work is quoted before anything is done.