Little & Co shut down its Pune office on 31 March. The office was on BS Dhole Patil Road, near the railway station.

Little Mumbai partner Gurudas Pal commented: “It was not economically viable to sustain that office, looking at the cost of rental, establishment and salary of the associates.”

The team of two associates who were in Pune left the firm to start their own practices in Pune and Kolhapur, confirmed Pal.

Pal said that the firm managed mandates in Pune – which were in litigation and real estate – primarily from Mumbai, and the volume of work in Pune was not too much.

Little & Co is a Bombay solicitors firm with a partnership of 10 including four equity partners.

The firm’s senior most partner Dara P Mehta retired from the partnership this year as he crossed the age of 80, but he continues to be a partner with the firm, Pal told Legally India. Equity partner Farrokh J Sidhwa also retired from the partnership.

Update: An earlier version of the story stated that Mehta continues to enjoy the same benefits which he did when he was in the firm's equity partnership. This has been corrected to state that Mehta is now a partner of the firm outside its equity partnership.