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Jones Day makes up Indian cap markets lawyer in Singapore


Manoj Bhargava
Manoj Bhargava
Jones Day has promoted India capital markets of counsel Manoj Bhargava to partner in its Singapore office.

Bhargava is be the only India capital markets-focused partner in Jones Day's Singapore office.

"Most international firms that are doing capital markets work in India are doing it out of their Singapore offices," he said, adding that one reason was that foreign firms were not allowed to open offices in Singapore.

"I think Singapore will continue to be a focal point for capital markets in India and in terms of cap markets work, the last 6 months of 2009 we saw a significant amount of activity."

Bhargava said that Jones Day was currently working on 8 to 10 initial public offerings (IPOs), such as the issues of DB Realty, Pune's Vascon Engineers and Bangalore's Nitesh Estates.

But he added that a larger number of deals were not yet public and that draft prospectuses had not yet been filed.

Bhargava stated that he was working on IPOs in the following industries: oil and gas, power and engineering, technology, real estate, the financial sector, metals and mining and engineering procurement construction (EPC).

Jones Day is one of the top-ranked international firms by volume in Indian IPOs, according to Legally India's IPO league tables so far this year.

In QIPs, Legally India ranked Jones Day second overall in October 2009, just behind Amarchand Mangaldas.

Jones Day's Indian best friend firm P&A Associates, however, does not feature in the capital markets league tables.

Bhargava commented: "We have a best friends relationship with P&A but like other firms, we continue to work very closely with all other Indian firms, such as Amarchand, AZB and Khaitan and Luthra."

Amarchand, AZB & Partners, Khaitan & Co and Luthra & Luthra are the top-ranked Indian firms in Legally India's IPO league table.

Bhargava is dual qualified in India and New York and holds an Indian passport.

He started his legal career after studying at APS University near his hometown of Allahabad and moved to the US 1996 to study at the New York University School of Law.

In 1997 he joined Debevoise & Plimpton in New York where he stayed until 2007 when he moved to Jones Day as an associate, becoming an of counsel in 2008.

When asked whether he would ever return to India, he said: "If the Indian market was to open to foreign law firms, at that point I may decide to come back to India but frankly at this time it is just as wonderful working from Singapore and then travelling there."

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