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Section 3 exclusion checker

Walk clause by clause through the Section 3 exclusions — from frivolous inventions to traditional knowledge — and see which ones an examiner might raise against your invention.

An educational walk-through, not an opinion. Section 3 is the most argued provision in Indian patent prosecution and the answers turn on how the claim is actually drafted, not on how the invention is described in conversation. Clause 3(g) is omitted and is not included below. This tool cannot tell you whether your application will be refused.

Section 3(a) — Frivolous inventions, or anything contrary to well established natural laws

Is the claimed invention frivolous, or does it claim something that contradicts settled science — a perpetual motion machine, free energy, a device that violates conservation laws?

Section 3(b) — Contrary to public order or morality, or seriously prejudicial to life, health or the environment

Would the primary or intended use be contrary to public order or morality, or cause serious prejudice to human, animal or plant life or health, or to the environment?

Section 3(c) — Mere discovery of a scientific principle, an abstract theory, or something occurring in nature

Is the contribution the discovery of a principle, a theory, or a living or non-living substance found in nature, rather than something made?

Section 3(d) — New form, new property or new use of a known substance without enhanced efficacy

Is this a new form of a substance already known — a salt, polymorph, isomer, particle size — without a demonstrated enhancement in its known efficacy? Or a new use for a known substance, or the mere use of a known process or apparatus without a new product or a new reactant?

Section 3(e) — Substance obtained by a mere admixture

Is it a mixture whose properties are only the sum of its components' properties, rather than something synergistic?

Section 3(f) — Mere arrangement or re-arrangement of known devices

Is it a rearrangement or duplication of known devices, each working independently in its known way?

Section 3(h) — Method of agriculture or horticulture

Is the claim to a method of agriculture or horticulture?

Section 3(i) — Method of treatment of humans or animals

Is it a method of medicinal, surgical, curative, prophylactic, diagnostic or therapeutic treatment of humans or animals?

Section 3(j) — Plants and animals, seeds, varieties, species, essentially biological processes

Does it claim plants or animals in whole or in part, seeds, varieties or species, or an essentially biological process for producing them? Micro-organisms are treated differently.

Section 3(k) — Mathematical or business method, computer programme per se, or algorithms

Is the contribution a mathematical method, a business method, an algorithm, or a computer programme as such — as opposed to a technical effect produced beyond the ordinary running of the program?

Section 3(l) — Literary, dramatic, musical or artistic works and cinematographic works

Is it an aesthetic creation — a work of literature, drama, music, art, film or television production?

Section 3(m) — Scheme, rule or method of performing a mental act, or of playing a game

Is it a scheme, a rule, a method of performing a mental act, or a method of playing a game?

Section 3(n) — Presentation of information

Is the contribution the way information is presented, rather than a technical means of presenting it?

Section 3(o) — Topography of integrated circuits

Is it the topography of an integrated circuit? These are protected under their own statute, not the Patents Act.

Section 3(p) — Traditional knowledge, or aggregation of known properties of traditionally known components

Is it in effect traditional knowledge, or an aggregation or duplication of the known properties of components that are traditionally known?

Work through the clauses and the flags will collect here.

What this tool is, and is not. It applies general rules to what you type in. It cannot see your file, your applicant category, which amendment governs your application, or what the Patent Office has issued. Nothing here is a legal opinion or a diary entry. Have anything that matters confirmed by a patent professional against the instrument in force.

Flagged on a clause that matters?

A Section 3 objection is usually answerable — by amendment, by evidence of technical effect, or by reframing the claim. It is answered by a professional reading the claims, not a questionnaire.

Get a patentability view Read Section 3