Law firms

The Bar Council of India (BCI) cannot be relied upon to take the legal services liberalisation process forward, said NLU Delhi vice chancellor (VC) Ranbir Singh on Saturday.

"HR Food Processing, which manufactures and markets dairy products under the brand name Osam, has raised Rs 45 crore (around $6.7m) in its Series B round of funding, it said in a statement. The round was led by Lok Capital-advised Growth Catalyst Partners. HR Food’s existing investor Aavishkaar also participated in this round,” reported VC Circle.

T&T Law Offices in Delhi’s GK-I was raided by a joint initiative of the Delhi police’s crime branch and the income tax department, which found Rs 13.56 crore in cash in new and old currency notes, according to NDTV and the PTI.

Gautam Khaitan, the managing partner of OP Khaitan & Co, has been arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigations (CBI) again for alleged graft in the Choppergate scam, this time together with former Air Force Marshal SP Tyagi and Tyagi’s cousin, reported the The Indian Express and others.

The range of salaries at India's law firms is wider than ever, with a 10-year PQE (post qualification experience) lawyer on remuneration (including bonuses) potentially ranging all the way from Rs 25 lakh per annum to Rs 200 lakh, according to salary data from four legal recruitment consultants compiled by Legally India.

Essar Power general counsel (GC) Sumant Nayak will be joining Desai & Diwanji as a partner in Mumbai.

"American Express Ventures, the corporate venture investment arm of American Express Co, has led a $4m (Rs 26.6 crore) funding round in fintech startup IndiaLends, its second transaction in the country in as many months,” reported the Economic Times.

“With his extensive experience in corporate law at the head of Singapore’s largest law firm, Mr Lucien Wong will provide a fresh perspective when he takes over as Attorney-General in January, lawyers said yesterday,” reported The Straits Times about the country’s “first A-G who has not spent time on the Bench or at the Attorney-General’s Chambers (AGC)”.

Weil Gotshal & Manges associate Nitin Konchady, who is a 2006 graduate of NLSIU Bangalore, has been promoted to partner in the London banking department’s Europe-focused high yield debt practice area in a partnership promotion round of 13, according to the firm’s press release.

DH Law added intellectual property (IP) lawyer Hasit Seth to set up an IP and Technology vertical for the firm, as a partner in Mumbai.

“Hero MotoCorp, India’s largest two-wheeler manufacturer, is investing up to Rs 205 crore in electric automotive startup Ather Energy for a 26-30% stake in one of the biggest deals in the nascent sector. Ather has received Rs 180 crore of the total investment with the rest due to be released in tranches. The deal values the three-year-old company at Rs 680 - Rs 790 crore.” reported The Economic Times.

Luthra & Luthra has moved its Bangalore office from the Ulsoor Road area to the third floor of Onyx Center on Museum Road, reported Bar & Bench, with space for 40 lawyers.

TRA managing partner Anirudh Rastogi has advised on a so-called satellite launch contract for Team Indus, which is the only Indian team competing for the Google-sponsored Lunar XPRIZE, which has set aside $20m for the first 90% privately-funded company to land a robot on the moon and send video footage of its 500m drive on the lunar surface back to earth.

Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm Lightspeed Venture Partners has invested $10m in Hiveloop Technology, which provides a B2B e-commerce marketplace platform under the brand ‘Udaan’. The company is founded by three former top executives of Flipkart, namely Sujeet Kumar, who led WS Retail at Flipkart, Amod Malviya, ex-CTO of Flipkart, and Vaibhav Gupta, former Senior VP who was leading product management and finance functions at Flipkart.

Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas Delhi partners and husband and wife team Harry Chawla and Niti Paul, who were first reported to be leaving in September, are “in the process of setting up our new firm” under the name Atlas Law Partners, Chawla told Bar & Bench.

"Direct-to-home television operator Dish TV will merge with Videocon d2h, creating India’s largest media company by sales. Dish TV is the market leader in the DTH space while Videocon is the third largest by subscribers. Their combined sales in FY16 were Rs 5,920 crore, more than Zee Entertainment, which had sales of Rs 5,850 crore. Both Zee and Dish are part of Subhash Chandra’s Essel Group.