White & Case London partner and illustrious NLSIU Bangalore alumnus Dipen Sabharwal has been bestowed the prestigious Queen’s Counsel (QC) tag by the bar of England & Wales.
It is the latest inroads graduates of India’s first national law school have made into global legal practice, after now regularly featuring in international partnership promotions (besides senior counsel designations in India now).
The 2001-graduate Sabharwal is well-known in the NLS and arbitration community, having been part of the team to win the Jessup moot in 1999, at which he has also been a judge since 2003.
He also heads White & Case’s EMEA disputes section for international arbitration, having been promoted to White & Case’s partnership in 2012.
He specialises in international commercial, construction and investment treaty arbitrations, and is triple-qualified in England, New York and India, and often works for Indian clients.
On top of that, he was Radhakrishnan Chevening scholarship, under which he completed a BCL at Oxford University in 2002, which he followed up by an LLM from the University of Michigan Law School in 2003. Plus, he also lectures at King’s College London and is the India Rapporteur for the Institute for Transnational Arbitration, according to his White & Case profile.
This year, Sabharwal was one of four solicitor advocates working at law firms to have taken silk alongside 104 barristers, as it’s colloquially described in the English bar in reference to the silk gowns worn by QCs.
The others, according to the Law Society Gazette are Sabharwal’s fellow White & Case partner and international arbitration co-head Aloke Ray (who appears to be of Indian origin, as well as Allen & Overy partner Mark Levy and boutique Fietta LLP principal Stephen Lewis Fietta.
The solicitor advocate stream of the bifurcated legal profession in the UK was created by reforms in 1990, to allow solicitors (e.g. lawyers working in law firms) to enjoy higher rights of audience before the courts of England & Wales, which was traditionally the reserve of barristers.
The QC tag, much like being a senior counsel in India, is mostly an honorary ceremonial designation bestowed to the most meritorious experienced practitioners at the English bar after application, though - much like becoming a senior counsel - it can carry with it a significant uplift in fees a lawyer can charge.
Update 13:52: Sabharwal commented: “As an international arbitration specialist, I spend a significant amount of time doing advocacy.
“I am delighted that this advocacy has been recognised through my appointment as a QC. I have been leading teams over the last seven years as a partner so I don’t expect the designation to change my practice dramatically in the short term.
“In the common law world, however, the title of QC stands as a badge of quality and excellence for both peers and clients, and I am very grateful for my designation.”
Comments
Other readers may kindly enlighten me too on the above aspect.
Well done Dipen - hats’ off
1. Dipen Sabharwal: for becoming QC
2. Vikramjit Banerjee: for becoming ASG
3. Menaka Guruswamy: for activism + advocacy
4. Shyam Balganesh: first to be professor of a top law school (Penn)
5.Nandan Nelvigi: first to be partner of a big international law firm (White & Case)
6. The founders of Trilegal
7. Shekhar Saraf: first to be HC judge (and likely for elevation to SC, from Cal HC)
8. Shamnad Basheer: for academics + activism, for founding IDIA and winning Infosys Prize
9. Lawrence Liang: for founding ALF and winning Infosys Prize
10. Tarunabh Khaitan: for academics, winning Letten Prize
Honourable Mentions: Arghya Sengupta, Shwetasree Majumder, Sudhir Krishnaswamy, Aditya Sondhi...
1. Low pay
2.Big teaching workload. Also made to teach subjects outside their specialisation.
3. Mediocre, dictatorial, corrupt, nepotistic and insecure VCs. Other faculty colleagues (who are from non-NLU backgrounds) are also resentful of NLU alumni teaching.
Right now, only JGLS has a large number of alumni from tier 1 NLUs, while there are smaller numbers at NLSIU,NALSAR, NLUD and NUJS. And some are teaching in Azim Premji, IIM Bangalore and IIT Delhi.
Academics is a less challenging career, and you can opinionate to your heart's content without any fear, especially if you have tenure and a top University at your back.
American academics may not be as well paid as BigLaw partners (or even associates), but they don't have to deal with the burn-out either, and their positions and opinions are respected, with excellent opportunities in politics (in India at least), later.
2. Vikramjit Banerjee as ASG - it is a political designation, and not many people are impressed with his performance as a counsel wearing a senior gown. I would rather mention people like Gaurav Agrawal and Dayan Krishnan, as they have far more impressive achievements in court.
7. Shekar Saraf - We hope he becomes a SC judge, but given that he has just been elevated and has a long way to go, it is highly speculative to say "likely for elevation to SC".
Points 2 and 7 show you don't have much clue about litigation.
9. Lawrence Liang - found guilty of sexual harassment by a POSH committee. Deeply shameful for an NLS alum. I known his challenge is pending, but having been found guilty after due inquiry, he certainly does not deserve any accolades
1. Lavanya Rajamani (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavanya_Rajamani)
2. Sandeep Sreekumar (http://www.baruch.cuny.edu/wsas/academics/philosophy/ssreekumar.htm) (will feature on a lot of lists by actual alumni)
3. Vikram Raghavan (https://www.linkedin.com/in/vikram-raghavan-131b898)
4. Sandeep Gopalan (https://www.huffingtonpost.com/author/sandeep-gopalan)
5. Naiyya Saggi (https://yourstory.com/2017/08/babychakra-naiyya-saggi-young-indian-mothers/)
6. Sanjay Bavikatte (https://www.christensenfund.org/about/staff/sanjay-bavikatte/)
7. Nandan Kamath (https://superlawyer.in/nandan-kamath-founder-lawnk-building-illustrious-career-sports-law-ipr/) (was supposedly good enough to have a realistic shot at playing cricket for India)
8. The late Rahul Cherian + Amba Salelkar (both have done a lot of work on disability laws in India)
9. Nithyanandan R (ex Infosys GC)
10. Sachin Malhan (https://www.ashoka.org/en-IN/people/sachin-malhan)
Apart from this, there are several others who have done stellar work and remain unsung on LI, like Suresh Jagirdar, Srinivas Raghavan, Rahul Rao, Trideep Pais, Shrimoyee Ghosh, Mrinal Satish, Rajshekar Rao, Warisha Farasat, Dayan Krishnan, Azmul Haque, Gitanjali Brandon, MS Srikar, Somnath Vatsa, Krishna Udaysankar, Priya Narayanan, and many others.
PS- not to forget the foreign students, some of whom are now MPs, Ministers and Judges in their home countries.
I made a set of different names to make the point that your list of "10 biggest achievers ever among NLS Alumni" will not be considered a representative list by many of the alumni, and does not do justice to several other alumni who have done very well for themselves in their chosen fields.
Lastly, cheers for Dipen, who has made an extraordinary career for himself!
NLUD as per their official website has 4 NLU LLB Alumni teaching there as permanent faculty, while there is one as a Research Associate (not sure whether this person teaches there too full-time). So now the numbers are all out in the open, provided Kian publishes this.
Mrinal Satish and Chinmayi Arun are the other two NLU LLB alumni I'd found on the website. Don't know if they have left already, as you are saying. Can be true. There's also a research associate listed on the website who's from an NLU, Ankita.
Give them another 5-10 years. I believe we will have a stellar RML lobby.
That said, I guess in terms of PCS-J selections, RML is definitely leading all NLUs. So, we already seem to have good alumni base in lower judiciary. Pls correct me if I am wrong.