On 21 November 2025, the Indian Trade Marks Registry did something it had never done before. It accepted a smell as a trade mark a "floral fragrance reminiscent of roses as applied to tyres," filed by Japanese manufacturer Sumitomo Rubber Industries. The decision broke decades of global deadlock between science and law, and it raises a question that sounds absurd until you think about it carefully: can you really own a scent?

I have studied and worked with intellectual property law in India, England, and the European Union. They share a common vocabulary trade marks, patents, infringement, distinctiveness but the moment you step inside the system in each place, you realise the words mean different things in practice. This post is about the differences that surprised me most, and what they taught me about how IP actually works.