AZB & Partners is relocating one of its Mumbai partners to Bangalore to ease the office's integration process after the merger with Anup Shah's local practice last month.

Mumbai partner Sai Krishna Bharathan will return to Bangalore four days per week, Tuesday to Friday, for around three months. He replaces AZB partner Vinita MG who has returned to Mumbai on 1 August after spending around eight months in the Bangalore office.

Before Vinita MG, Barathan had already spent four months in Bangalore to handle the departure of Murali Ananthasivan and Vivek Chandy who went independent from AZB as M&C Partners, which has since merged with J Sagar Associates (JSA).

Barathan said AZB was very excited about its merger with Shah, adding that a large part of his work there will involve aligning the two firms' practices throughout the merger.

He has been with AZB for seven years and specialises in M&A, funds and FDI real estate work. Having also studied at National Law School of India University Bangalore (NLSIU) until 1995, he added that the place was "pretty close to his heart".

Barathan also defended the fit with Shah's practice, which is primarily real estate based.

He said that AZB's M&A and funds practices would work very well with real estate, which is one of the city's largest industries and Shah's client list would be a good target for cross-selling of corporate work.

Shah will head up AZB's Bangalore office and the merged firm is hoping to move into a newly constructed office by the end of the year.