Articles

Awareness on Intellectual Property Rights Among College Students, A Study with Special Reference to Kozhikode District

/0 Comments/in /by

Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) play a crucial role in protecting innovation, creativity, and intellectual assets. The present study examines the awareness of Intellectual Property Rights among college students. The objectives of the study are to assess the level of IPR awareness among college students and to examine differences in awareness based on gender and course of study. Both primary and secondary data were used for the study. Primary data were collected from 50 college students through a structured questionnaire using the purposive sampling method, while secondary data were gathered from books, journals, research articles, government reports, and WIPO publications. Responses were measured using a five-point scale. Descriptive statistics, One-Sample t-test, Independent Samples t-test, and One-Way ANOVA were employed for data analysis.

The results revealed that college students possess a significant level of awareness regarding Intellectual Property Rights. The Independent Samples t-test indicated no significant differences in IPR awareness between male and female students. However, the One-Way ANOVA revealed significant differences among students from different course categories in selected dimensions of IPR awareness. The study concludes that while the overall awareness of IPR among college students is satisfactory, variations exist across certain course categories. The findings emphasize the need for strengthening IPR education and awareness programmes in higher educational institutions.

Relevance of IPR in Small Businesses

/in /by

Small businesses in India have always been one of the major occupations in rural as well as urban terrain and they are major source of income for the middle class group. As urbanization has increased the demand for the small services like grocery shops, bakeries, vegetable shops, laundry shops, juice centers, sweet shops, small hotels etc. Majorly the urban population is a mix of all the classes of people but a considerable portion is occupied by the middle and low income group, which has resulted in requirement of small services, and retail shops. As of a result of which the small businesses mushroom in the different localities, in different sizes so that they can cater to all the segments of consumers. Small business organizations contribute to the economy significantly by distributing the finished goods to the ultimate consumers, and they also create jobs in smaller units. The large business organizations contribute to economy by creating jobs in a bulk, economies of scale. The large scale organizations have the accessibility to hire legal professionals like legal advisers and naturally they give the suggestions on legal aspects for a smooth conduct of the business. In this context large or medium sized organizations have proximity to legal protection for their inventions, design, copyrights, trademarks etc, and they consciously protect their rights by patents or trademark and so on. In this article we have made an attempt to understand the extent of application of IPR in small and micro businesses.