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The FER is not a rejection. It is the examiner's opening position, and a well-structured response is how most Indian applications get to grant.
The First Examination Report is the patent office's formal list of objections to your application. Getting one is routine — almost every application receives one. What matters is the response, which in India must be filed within the prescribed period from the date the FER is issued.
What the FER typically contains
- Novelty and inventive-step objections citing specific prior-art documents
- Objections under Section 3 that the subject matter is not patentable
- Clarity, support, and definitiveness objections on the claims
- Formal requirements — drawings, the priority document, statements about corresponding foreign applications
Building the response
For each substantive objection, the response either argues that the objection is wrong or amends the claims to overcome it — and usually a combination. Amendments cannot add matter beyond the original disclosure, so the room to manoeuvre was set when the specification was drafted. A good technical argument distinguishes the invention from the cited art on a feature that is actually claimed, not just mentioned.
The strongest responses engage with the examiner's specific reasoning rather than restating the invention. Show why the cited document does not lead a skilled person to your claim.
The hearing
If objections remain after the written response, the applicant is offered a hearing. This is an opportunity, not a bad sign — a short discussion often resolves points that several rounds of paper could not, and written submissions after the hearing lock in what was agreed.
Deadlines in prosecution are strict and mostly non-extendable. The response should be scoped and started well before the due date, not in the final week.