This works out to Rs 13.2 lakh per year or up to Rs 15.4 lakh including the performance-related bonus, as compared to 2014’s figure of Rs 11.28 lakh per year and a maximum of Rs 2 lakh bonus.

The increase will be equivalent to 17 per cent.

Trilegal partner Nishant Parikh confirmed the increase and said that it would be effective for freshers joining in 2016.

Students have been told by the firm of the new package.

The firm had told Legally India in an article published by Mint yesterday, that it would “most certainly” be revising its base salaries upwards shortly, with partner Anand Prasad saying: “If the economics are sustainable, why shouldn’t younger lawyers get paid more.”

The bump would put Trilegal’s base pay on the same level as S&R Associates’, just a little over Talwar Thakore & Associates (at Rs 13 lakh) and just Rs 1 lakh behind Khaitan & Co, which currently tops the market with a guaranteed base pay of Rs 14.4 lakh per year plus up to Rs 1.8 lakh of bonus.

However, unlike at Trilegal, at those firms the new base salaries will apply to the existing associates too.

The Amarchand Mangaldas Mumbai-region has said it was offering Rs 12 lakh per year plus up to Rs 3 lakh bonus at present.

Amarchand Delhi may offer between Rs 14 lakh to Rs 15 lakh as base pay, without a bonus, though Legally India has not been able to officially confirm the figure from the firm.

J Sagar Associates (JSA) had told Legally India that it would consider revising fresher base pay later this month.

The last time the legal market has witnessed similarly aggressive fresher salary raises by the majority of top firms in concert was in 2010, when Amarchand, Khaitan, Luthra & Luthra and Trilegal all broke the Rs 10 lakh per year barrier in base pay for the first time.

For Khaitan that had translated to a nearly 50 per cent increase in base salaries at the time.