Clifford Chance senior partner Stuart Popham (pictured left) recounts his UK ministerial visit to India last month, which included Ambani, best friends and mile-high parties, as first published by the UK's The Lawyer magazine.
As the only practising lawyer on the PM’s ’team’ I had to wear several hats, representing Clifford Chance (as always) the legal profession and the wider City in my role as chairman of TheCityUK.
Briefed in the garden of 10 Downing Street, the preferred location as long as the summer holds out, it was decided that the delegation would be split into two groups. One heading to Bangalore and another, which I joined, accompanying George Osborne to Mumbai to discuss financial services. There with the CEOs of Barclays, Standard Chartered, Deutsche Bank, the London Stock Exchange and Aviva Insurance, plus the chair of Standard Life. We attended meetings at The Bombay Stock Exchange (ringing the bell to start trading) with business leaders, including our own ’best friend’ Zia Mody of AZB & Partners. We discussed cooperation, deals to be done.
From there, we five plus the chancellor had an hour with Mukesh Ambani, chairman of Reliance Industries, to discuss the world of business before meeting the entire board of India’s central bank. This was followed by a working lunch, allowing the chancellor to make his keynote address and we, the business folk, to network. Collectively, the day gave a real insight into the inner workings of the Indian economy and underlined that this really was a working visit rather than a backdrop for political photo opportunities.
We dashed to the airport just as the monsoons of Mumbai had reduced traffic to a standstill. However, travelling with the diplomatic seal of approval does help and we were waved through security to board the plane to join the PM’s delegation for a dazzling reception that evening.
Day Two: Ministerial meetings aplenty…
Unusual though it might be for them, the various banking CEOs found themselves in a minibus being driven to meetings with ministers around Delhi. Chancellor Osborne and his team managed a Range Rover. We met the three senior civil servants in the Commerce Ministry who are responsible for negotiating the free trade agreement between India and the EU, and who will do the same with the US FTA next year. I am hoping that this will be the basis on which professional service firms (including lawyers) are able to establish in India. Then on from there to see the minister of finance for another positive discussion. I had a one-to-one with the law minister as a courtesy call.
At this stage I should tell you that the humidity in Delhi must have been over 100 per cent in that it would not have been any wetter had it been raining.
Finally, we have a police-assisted dash to the airport, making great time, to find ourselves on the chartered British Airways 747. You’d think that we’d have been ready to collapse by this point, after 48 hours with little sleep, but after running entirely on adrenalin for two days it’s surprisingly difficult to turn it off. Accordingly, the 50 business, academic, sporting and other ’mission members’ spent the next five hours standing to mix with the 50 press corps, reliving the last two days, putting the world to rights and generally networking.
Eventually, the cabin crew gave up any chance of pushing trolleys and packets of nuts were passed through a human chain from one end of the plane to the other. The last hour and a half before landing actually saw most people grabbing some sleep before we arrived precisely at the time the day’s agenda showed (4am), proving that it really is possible for airlines to run exactly to schedule (providing you have the relevant authority!).
Stuart Popham is senior partner at Clifford Chance and chairman of TheCityUK.
This article was first published by the UK's The Lawyer magazine.
Stuart Popham's passage to India: 'cooperation, deals to be done'
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Friends if you want to give suggestion for arguments in petition you can send email to . Many valuable argument has already been given.
Do you really have the courage to do this? If not, then you are simply the face of all that is wrong with India and all that has made the lives of its citizens misreable.
Nuff said..
I will make sure every spammer in the world get to know you better for your signature campaign. Hell you might get so many volunteers for signatures, you may even think of abandoning this pseudo email.
[...]
My message to you: If you really want to do something (even for a signature campaign) in order to protect your country from this so called 'fight', describe your real self and your agenda. Do not hide behind the emails..
But I would appreciate if you could kindly throw some light on the contents of the petition. Particularly, could you let me know how these foreign firms are like East India Company who will loot the country and ruin our Indian culture (preferably with some facts or substance to back these claims)?
As soon as you can provide me with this info, I promise you my undying support for this cause. I will even blacken the faces of foreign lawyers and burn their effigies on the streets. I will also hurl a shoe on a foreign firm partner. Anything for you and your cause !!!
i hope you are a flame 1, coz if you are not I wonder how your clients stick with you.
"They are imperialist forces like east India Co who wants" ---> forces and wants cannot appear together in an English sentence. Forces like east India co "want". Please send your petition to a foreign law firm to get it proof-read.
I think it is only some people from so-called elite national law colleges who is supporting foreign law firms. They want to be the ghulam of foreign law firms and want Indian law firms to close.
I thought 1 was good, but 6, you made my day.
Needed a laugh after a long day at an IMPERIALISTIC INDIAN LAW FIRM!!
"Legal profession is too sacrosanct to be polluted by deep pockets of foreign governments or foreign lawyers"
www.legallyindia.com/201007301152/Law-firms/clifford-chance-to-have-india-office-by-2012-vows-popham
Let's accept it guys: It is mainly young lawyers in the 25-45 age group who would be happy if foreign law firms open offices. Most senior advocates and owners of family-run corporate law firms are against it.
Reminds one of the firman inveigled from the Mughal emperor Jahangir. "Oh, we have only come to trade". Yes, soon the trade was protected by the sword. And the flag followed the trade.
The home of cotton was inundated with cotton - cheap textiles from Manchester, depriving millions of their livelihood. "The bones of the cotton-weavers are bleaching the plains of India". That was the refrain then, and only time will tell how Lord Popham and his cohorts take over and subvert the delivery and administration of justice - a clever inocuous ploy in usurping the republic again.
No maharajahs this time round. Only "nabobs of law". History has an uncanny knack of repeating itself. The first time it is tragedy. The second time it is going to be a farce.
these same 'great' people are running law firms which stand to lose if there is competition --- these are not unbiased views
i work at one such 'foreign' law firm and I have worked in an Indian firm as well. There are significant differences in approach to work and work ethic. And no, in my view, as a lawyer and as an individual, Mr. Bhasin is not correct and just by pointing to his article you don't score any brownie points. Anyway, I am confident that in my lifetime things will change. And for the better, in my book.
Please however allow the rest of us, who also do a hard day's work and apply our brains to solving our clients' problems and helping the economy grow, to charge a decent fee for our services.
The hypocricy and childishness of the East India Company argument/imperialist is beyond belief, in a day and age when Indian groups are acquiring companies and businesses overseas, multinationals are prospering in India and even Communist China has opened up to foreign law firms.
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