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Women make up only 15% of senior law firm lawyers: Amarchand & banking with most female heavy-hitters; JSA, Trilegal & projects the fewest

Women-friendly workplaces: Legally rare (Photo (c) AMC)
Women-friendly workplaces: Legally rare (Photo (c) AMC)

Amarchand Mangaldas emerged as the large law firm with the highest ratio of female lawyers ranked by the 2014 Chambers and Partners lawyer directory, while J Sagar Associates (JSA) and Trilegal came lowest with as few as 6 per cent of senior female lawyers.

Meanwhile, banking and finance was the major practice area with the largest percentage of women - 34 per cent - compared to corporate and private equity where only around 15 per cent of ranked lawyers were women.

Firm wise (see table below)

Amarchand, Khaitan & Co, JSA, AZB & Partners, Luthra & Luthra and Trilegal were the only law firms with more than seven lawyers ranked by the directory out of 150 Indian law firms.

However, nine lawyers, or 37.5 per cent of Amarchand’s 24 total ranked lawyers, were women; by contrast, at JSA and Trilegal, only one woman was ranked out of 18 and 11 total ranked lawyers respectively, giving percentages of just over 5 and 9 per cent.

Luthra had the second-most ranked female lawyers after Amarchand with four women, or one-fourth of its 16 rankings, belonging to women.

AZB with 17.65 per cent out of 17 total rankings and Khaitan with almost 16 per cent out of 19 total rankings were in a similar range.

At the mid-size firms, ALMT Legal and Wadia Ghandy performed best, as each had three ranked women as against four men, making up 43 per cent of the ranked lawyers at the firm.

Dua Associates, Economic Laws Practice (ELP) and Talwar Thakore & Associates had only one ranked woman each out of seven rankings.

The only two firms with a majority of ranked female lawyers were Samvad Partners and Juris Corp, where two thirds of ranked lawyers were women (four out of six in Samvad's case, and two out of three at Juris Corp).

Practice wise (see table below)

Banking and finance emerged as the most female-friendly practice area out of the six largest practice areas, according to Chambers.

Over 34 per cent out of a total of 38 rankings in banking were earned by women, while projects was the large practice area with the fewest women: only two women (less than 7 per cent) out of 30 total ranked lawyers.

Banking and finance, Mumbai and Delhi-based corporate and M&A, private equity, intellectual property and projects, infrastructure and energy were the areas with over 30 lawyer rankings.

Insurance was the most women-friendly practice area overall with three out of five ranks going to women, followed by competition and anti trust, where four out of seven ranked lawyers were women.

According to Chambers data, women were not represented at all in law firm practices such as capital markets, employment, shipping and Delhi-based real estate.

And in the dispute resolution senior counsel rankings, there were also zero women ranked out of 23 senior counsel.

However, Delhi dispute resolution boasted 28 per cent ranked women, compared to Mumbai where in dispute resolution there was only one out of 15 women.

Chambers & Partners' ranked women lawyers out of total ranked lawyers per firm

OrganisationTotal ranked womenTotal ranked menTotal ranked lawyersPercentage women ranked
Amarchand & Mangaldas & Suresh A Shroff & Co 9 15 24 37.5
Khaitan & Co 3 16 19 15.79
J Sagar Associates 1 17 18 5.56
AZB & Partners 3 14 17 17.65
Luthra & Luthra Law Offices 4 12 16 25
Trilegal 1 10 11 9.09
ALMT Legal (Indian Advocates) 3 4 7 42.86
Wadia Ghandy & Co 3 4 7 42.86
Dua Associates 1 6 7 14.29
Economic Laws Practice 1 6 7 14.29
Talwar, Thakore & Associates 1 6 7 14.29
Samvad Partners 4 2 6 66.67
Kochhar & Co 1 5 6 16.67
Nishith Desai Associates 1 4 5 20
Phoenix Legal 1 4 5 20
S&R Associates 1 4 5 20
Mulla & Mulla & Craigie Blunt & Caroe 0 5 5 0
Poovayya & Co 1 3 4 25
Crawford Bayley & Co 0 4 4 0
Desai & Diwanji 0 4 4 0
DSK Legal 0 4 4 0
IndusLaw 0 4 4 0
Majmudar & Partners 0 4 4 0
Platinum Partners 0 4 4 0
Juris Corp 2 1 3 66.67
Anand and Anand Advocates 1 2 3 33.33
Bharucha & Partners 1 2 3 33.33
Kanga & Co 1 2 3 33.33
Karanjawala & Co 1 2 3 33.33
Rajani, Singhania & Partners 1 2 3 33.33
Tuli & Co 1 2 3 33.33
K&S Partners 0 3 3 0
Lakshmikumaran & Sridharan 0 3 3 0
Link Legal 0 3 3 0
Tatva Legal 0 3 3 0
Vaish Associates 0 3 3 0
Dave & Girish & Co 1 1 2 50
K Law 1 1 2 50
R K Dewan & Co 1 1 2 50
Udwadia, Udeshi and Argus Partners 1 1 2 50
Archer & Angel 0 2 2 0
Bhatt & Saldanha 0 2 2 0
BMR Legal 0 2 2 0
CrestLaw Partners 0 2 2 0
Dhir & Dhir Associates 0 2 2 0
Federal & Rashmikant 0 2 2 0
HSA Advocates 0 2 2 0
LexOrbis Intellectual Property Practice 0 2 2 0
MNK Law Offices 0 2 2 0
PH Parekh & Co 0 2 2 0
Saikrishna & Associates 0 2 2 0
Seth Dua & Associates 0 2 2 0
SNG & Partners 0 2 2 0
Aarna Law 0 1 1 0
Abhishek Manu Singhvi - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Aditya Sondhi Law Chambers 0 1 1 0
Advani & Co. 0 1 1 0
Advaya Legal 0 1 1 0
Agarwal Law Associates 0 1 1 0
Amarjit & Associates 0 1 1 0
ANA Law 0 1 1 0
Anil Divan - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
A.N. Jayaram 0 1 1 0
Anup S Shah Law Firm 0 1 1 0
APJ-SLG Law Offices 0 1 1 0
A.R.A. Law 0 1 1 0
Arvind P Datar - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Ashok Desai - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Aspi Chinoy - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Bharucha & Associates 0 1 1 0
Bhasin and Bhasin Associates 0 1 1 0
Bhasin & Co 0 1 1 0
Bose & Mitra & Co 0 1 1 0
Chadha & Chadha 0 1 1 0
Chambers of S. Venkiteswaran 0 1 1 0
Darius Khambata - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
De Penning & De Penning 0 1 1 0
Dhall Law Chambers 0 1 1 0
Dhaval Vussonji & Associates 0 1 1 0
D.M. Harish & Co. 0 1 1 0
DP Ahuja & Co 0 1 1 0
Dushyant Dave - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Fali Nariman - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Finsec Law Advisors 0 1 1 0
Gagrats 0 1 1 0
Gandhi & Associates 0 1 1 0
Groser & Groser 0 1 1 0
Hariani & Co 0 1 1 0
Harish Salve - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Holla & Holla Advocates 0 1 1 0
HSB Partners 0 1 1 0
IC Legal 0 1 1 0
I.L.A. Pasrich & Company 0 1 1 0
Inttl Advocare 0 1 1 0
Iqbal Chagla - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Janak Dwarkadas - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Jehangir Mistry - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Juris Legal & Financial Services 0 1 1 0
Kachwaha & Partners 0 1 1 0
K K Venugopal - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Koura & Co 0 1 1 0
KoVe Global LLP 0 1 1 0
Krishna & Saurastri 0 1 1 0
Kusuma Advocates 0 1 1 0
Lall & Sethi Advocates 0 1 1 0
Law Chambers of G. Nataraj 0 1 1 0
Lexygen 0 1 1 0
Mason & Associates 0 1 1 0
Messrs Doijode Associates 0 1 1 0
Mohan & Associates 0 1 1 0
MPC Legal 0 1 1 0
M S Syali - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
M. T. Miskita & Company 0 1 1 0
Mukul Rohatgi - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Mundkur Law Partners 0 1 1 0
M. V. Kini & Co 0 1 1 0
MZM Legal 0 1 1 0
Naik Naik & Co 0 1 1 0
Obhan & Associates 0 1 1 0
P & A Law Offices 0 1 1 0
Parimal K. Shroff & Co 0 1 1 0
Percy Pardiwala - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Porus Kaka - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
P P Rao - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
PSP Law Office 0 1 1 0
Rafique Dada - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Rahul Narichania - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Rajinder Narain & Co 0 1 1 0
RDA Legal 0 1 1 0
Remfry & Sagar 0 1 1 0
Rohinton Nariman - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Sarin & Co 0 1 1 0
Scriboard 0 1 1 0
S Eshwar Consultants 0 1 1 0
S Ganesh - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Sibal & Company 0 1 1 0
S Majumdar & Co 0 1 1 0
Soli Dastur - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Soli Sorabjee - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
Solomon & Co 0 1 1 0
S.S. Rana & Co 0 1 1 0
Subramaniam, Nataraj & Associates 0 1 1 0
The Chambers of George A. Rebello 0 1 1 0
Thiru & Thiru 0 1 1 0
TLA (Tree of Life Associates) 0 1 1 0
Tyabji Dayabhai 0 1 1 0
Vidhii Partners 0 1 1 0
Virag Tulzapurkar - Sole Practitioner 0 1 1 0
W.S. Kane and Co 0 1 1 0
Industry aggregate 51 women
315 men
366 total
14%

Source: Chambers & Partners. Note: The table specifies counts only unique lawyers ranked per firm

Chambers & Partners' female lawyers ranked by practice areas

Practice AreaTotal Female RankingsTotal Male RankingsTotal RankingsPercentage Of Ranked Women
Private Equity 7 42 49 14.29
Corporate/M&A: Mumbai-based 8 37 45 17.78
Banking & Finance 13 25 38 34.21
Corporate/M&A: New Delhi-based 5 29 34 14.71
Intellectual Property 4 26 30 13.33
Projects, Infrastructure & Energy 2 28 30 6.67
Dispute Resolution: Senior Advocates 0 23 23 0
Technology, Media, Telecoms (TMT) 2 20 22 9.09
Tax 3 18 21 14.29
Real Estate: Mumbai-based 1 18 19 5.26
Dispute Resolution: New Delhi-based 5 13 18 27.78
Capital Markets 0 18 18 0
Corporate/M&A: Bangalore-based 2 15 17 11.76
Dispute Resolution: Mumbai-based 1 15 16 6.25
Aviation 1 13 14 7.14
Competition/Antitrust 4 7 11 36.36
Intellectual Property: Litigation 2 9 11 18.18
Shipping 0 11 11 0
Employment 0 10 10 0
Tax: Senior Advocates 0 8 8 0
Dispute Resolution: Bangalore-based 1 6 7 14.29
Real Estate: Bangalore-based 2 4 6 33.33
Insurance 3 2 5 60
International Trade 1 4 5 20
Corporate/M&A: Chennai-based 1 3 4 25
Dispute Resolution: Insolvency 0 4 4 0
Real Estate: New Delhi-based 0 3 3 0

Source: Chambers & Partners. Note: Some individuals appear in more than one practice area.

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