DSK Legal senior partner Tushar Ajinkya has joined Economic Laws Practice (ELP) with a team of three in Mumbai.

He specialises in corporate and commercial work, including information technology, pharmaceutical, cross-border M&A and forensics and fraud investigations.

Also joining with him are Ankita Kashyap, as counsel, and Sukanya Sehgal and Chirag Jain as associates.

Ajinkya had been with DSK Legal for 17 years, since 2001, having started his career after a 1999 LLB from GLC Mumbai, joining Nishith Desai Associates for two years.

ELP managing partner Suhail Nathani told us earlier today: “He is a professional with two decades of experience, he was with Nishith, opened their Silicon Valley office before DSK... He’s an established force.”

“We are just looking for like-minded people who can fit in and grow my firm,” he added.

DSK managing partner Anand Desai commented: “I wish him well. All very amicable.”

Nathani added: “We’ve grown up our corporate team substantially,” noting that Ajinkya would be the 8th partner in its corporate practice.

In the past 24 months, the firm had hired 12 partners, of whom seven were in tax and tax litigation, which “continued to remain the core practice of ELP”, he said.

Ajinkyar was the third lateral hire into the corporate team in the last two years.