Anand & Anand managing associates Bhardwaj, who is also head of general enforcement at the firm, and Mehra, together with associate Upadhyay and two other junior fee-earners are understood to join Luthra & Luthra on 1 October.

Mehra and Bhardwaj will join Luthra & Luthra as senior associates with Upadhyay joining as an associate.

Bhardwaj focuses on enforcement in relation to counterfeit products in the fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) space for large multinationals such as Unilever and Procter & Gamble, according to a lawyer with knowledge of the IP industry.

Mehra is understood to have been involved in spearheading IP software enforcement practice at Anand & Anand, having worked with clients such as Microsoft and the Business Software Alliance (BSA). He graduated from NLIU Bhopal in 2003, according to his profile on business networking site Linked-in.

The team of five will create an IP practice at Luthra & Luthra of around 15 lawyers, which will be co-headed by the new joiners and partners Ameet Datta and Gayatri Roy. Datta was a partner at Anand & Anand until November 2008 when he joined Luthra with a team of four, as reported by The Lawyer magazine at the time.

Anand & Anand is India’s second-largest IP firm and consists of roughly 70 lawyers, according to a survey by the magazine Business World.

The lawyers, Luthra & Luthra and Anand & Anand declined to comment when contacted.

Last week Legally India reported that India’s largest IP firm Remfry & Sagar lost two IP partners to Lakshmikumaran & Sridharan.