Notice of Right to Claim Priority Based Upon Applications Previously Filed in India On January 3, 1995, the Ministry of India (Department of Industrial Development) caused a Notification to be published in The Gazette of India: Extraordinary [Part II-Sec. 3(ii)]. This Notification included the following text: "[I]n exercise of the powers conferred by subsection (1) of section 133 of the Patents Act, 1970 (39 of 1970), the Central Government hereby declares each of [the members of the World Trade Organization, which includes the United States of America] to be a convention country for all the provisions of the said Act". Section 135(1) of the Patents Act, 1970 (39 of 1970) of India provides as follows: Without prejudice to the provisions contained in section 6, where a person has made an application for a patent in respect of an invention in a convention country (hereinafter referred to as the "basic application"), and that person or the legal representative or assignee of that person makes an application under this Act for a patent within twelve months after the date on which the basic application was made, the priority date of a claim of the complete specification, bearing a claim based on matter disclosed in the basic application, is the date of making of the basic application". Given the above-referenced Notification in The Gazette of India and Section 135 of the Indian Patents Act, 1970, India is deemed a foreign country which affords privileges in the case of applications filed in the United States or to citizens of the United States similar to those afforded under 35 U.S.C. 119. Accordingly, an application for patent for an invention filed in the United States by any person who has, or whose legal representatives or assigns have, previously regularly filed an application for a patent for the same invention in India shall have the benefit of the filing date in India in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 119. Such persons became entitled to claim that benefit on the basis of applications filed in India on, or after, January 3, 1995, the date of publication of the above-referenced Notification in The Gazette of India. January 13, 1997 BRUCE A. LEHMAN Assistant Secretary of Commerce and Commissioner of Patents and Trademarks