Section 100 of the Patents Act lets the Central Government use a patented invention for the purposes of Government

Background

The Kerala High Court has held that Section 100 of the Patents Act, 1970 takes in the Government's entitlement to use a patented invention to manufacture a medicine and sell it on a non-commercial basis to a needy patient; this is the provision that ruling rests on.
Section 100 is headed 'Power of Central Government to use inventions for purposes of Government'.
It allows the Central Government, and any person authorised in writing by it, to use the invention for the purposes of Government at any time after an application for a patent has been filed or a patent has been granted.
Where the invention had already been recorded, tested or tried by or for the Government before the priority date, that use may be made free of any royalty or other remuneration to the patentee.
Otherwise the terms are agreed with the patentee, or in default of agreement are determined by the High Court on a reference under section 103, and the patentee is paid not more than adequate remuneration in the circumstances of each case.
The Government must notify the patentee as soon as practicable, except in case of national emergency or other circumstances of extreme urgency or for noncommercial use.
The same section, in subsection (6), adds the right to sell, on a non-commercial basis, the goods made in exercise of that right.
The Kerala High Court read 'purposes of Government' as taking in the State's duty to improve public health under Article 47 of the Constitution of India.