The 20 Prominent Women Lawyers to Watch in 2020

www.theenterpriseworld.com | APAC Edition | June 2020

THE 20 PROMINENT

WOMEN LAWYERS TO WATCH IN 2020

MS MAMTA JHA SENIOR PARTNER & HEAD – LITIGATION & OPPOSITION INTLL ADVOCATE

MS MAMTA RANI JHA

A LEADING NAME IN THE FIELD OF IP LAW

BE

F 5 RECOMM ST O E ED ND

THE

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The law maintains a balance between poor and rich, strong and weak, and so on. A legitimate framework fundamentally gives a system to individuals to live respectively in an obliged way. It keeps people from doing things they should do. And it will likewise urge a person to accomplish something he wouldn’t like to do.

While digitization is taking place in almost all the sectors, the need for law is increasing day by day. Technology took the world closer and with the rising business opportunities, the number of disputes also increased.

An idea isn’t your until it gets patented. The document makes you owner weather it may be a property, business, or anything else. In this scenario, we always need a lawyer who makes a legally secured way for your destiny. The sector of law and litigation was once a men’s monopoly.

Today’s era is completely different. Today, there is no such thing a woman cannot do. In the law sector too, Women lawyers are leading the mission to make the world a peaceful place to live by providing different law and litigation services with the holistic approach.

In this special issue of The Enterprise World, The 20 Prominent Women Lawyers to Watch in 2020, we feel proud to feature the 20 woman lawyers that made a unique position in law landscape.

The Cover Story feature is Ms. Mamta Rani Jha. She is a leading lawyer in the field of IPR. With over 17 years’ experience in the field of litigation, she has carved a unique position in the IPR landscape in India. Ms. Mamta Jha, Senior Partner and Head – Litigation & Opposition at Inttl Advocare .

Readout an interview with Ms. Seema Jhingan, Partner at LexCounsel. LexCounsel is a corporate, commercial and litigation law firm with offices in New Delhi, Bhubaneshwar, Odisha and associate offices in major cities across India.

A law adds values to civilization. The law creates the path of the welfare of society. By knowing their responsibilities women lawyers are helping their clients to solve disputes, get legally corrected to expand their businesses.

Have a read to our special editorial feature Upshot Metros, this time conveying interesting information about the financial capital of Sri Lanka, Colombo. There is a lot more inside!

“Opportunities don't happen, you create them.” --Chris Grosser Happy Reading!

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The Enterprise World solely owns all the reprint rights.

Leaders in Spotlight This issue of The Enterprise World, The 20 Prominent Women Lawyers to Watch in 2020 features, Featuring for the cover story is Ms. Mamta Jha, Senior Partner and Head – Litigation & Opposition at Inttl Advocare. She firmly believes in empowering her clients across various sectors by providing comprehensive, holistic, and innovative solutions at Inttl Advocare.

Readout an interview with Ms. Shweta Bharti, Partner at Hammurabi & Solomon and get known about her journey towards the success and the firm’s offerings in the law landscape. Hammurabi & Solomon is a multi-specialty Law Firm, specializing in niche areas of law like Public Policy and general corporate commercial laws.

DGS Associates is a partnership firm that Ms. Ameeta Verma Duggal co-founded with Ms. Niti Sudhakar in 2004. DGS is a boutique multidisciplinary law firm with a primary focus on international trade, corporate and commercial laws, serving domestic and international clients.

Naik Naik& Company has an unparalleled service in dispute resolution across all practices of corporate & commercial, intellectual property, private equity,

restructuring & insolvency, technology, media, telecommunications, and whitecollar crimes. In a candid talk with Ms. Madhu Gadodia, Partner at the firm, discover more about the firm and her journey towards the prominence.

Ms. Anita Dugar is one of such women influential lawyers, who made her unique position in the law landscape by providing quality and determined law services through the firm Samisti Legal.

Aarna Law is a boutique practice, specializing in complex crossborder disputes and transactions.

Though they are relatively young as a practice, their law practice legacy spans nearly a century which has taught them the importance of Excellence, Responsibility, Integrity, and Service to the Courts, clients, profession, and the broader ecosystem. In an interview with Ms. Kamala Naganand, discover the journey of the firm since inception and their offerings.

Where there is growth in any sector, there are disputes. To solve such disputes and maintain harmony, Ms. Kruti Desai is making smart and hard efforts via ALMT Legal. Have a read to an interview with her and get inspired.

Ms. Komal Solomon has been in

the legal practice for about 25 years and has been with the Firm since 2006. Solomon & Co. was founded in 1909 and is amongst India’s oldest law firms. The Firm has 3 offices, 2 in Mumbai and 1 in Pune.

The Firm provides legal services across the Republic of India.

Solomon & Co. is a full-service firm and is qualified and competent to provide legal service on all areas of Indian law.

Ms. Anupama Hebbar is a lawyer with vast and diverse experience who can be an obstacle breaker for your business. She has been transforming businesses from long through the firm Keystone Partners – Advocates and Solicitors.

AMLEGALS was founded by Shri Anandaday Misshra, way back in the year 2005, as Mishra Associates. In a candid talk with Ms. Easha Manchanda, Associate at the firm, get inspired by her journey towards the success and what AMLEGALS offers.

While listing out The Prominent Women Lawyers, it will be a sin if we don’t mention Ms. Rebecca John, Ms. Menaka Guruswamy, Ms. Pinky Anand, Ms. Indira Jaysing, Ms. Flavia Agnes, Ms. Vrinda Grover, Ms. Karuna Nandy, and Ms. Meenakshi Lekhi as they are a true source of motivation for many in the field of law and litigation.

Content 30

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Subathra Mylsamy

Kruti Desai Legal Insight.

Business Instinct.

Committed to Success

24 Ameeta Verma Duggal Practicing Excellence

Mamta Rani Jha A leading name in the eld of IP law

08

Shweta Bharti

Kamala Naganand

An unmatched excellence in the eld of law

Transforming the legal industry for better tomorrow

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28

How to improve communication skills for better success

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36

COLOMBO – The commercial Capital of Sri Lanka

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64

Anita Dugar A leading lawyer, you can trust

Madhu Gadodia

60

A lawyer you can always trust on!

Easha Manchanda A Smart Lawyer For Every Matter

Anupama Hebbar A Dispute Resolution Specialist

Seema Jhingan

Komal Solomon

46

Committed to protecting what matters most

A Super Lawyer Committed to Expertise

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Did You Know?

Is depression a very serious disease or is it just a delusion of the mind?

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08

Cover story

MS MAMTA JHA SENIOR PARTNER & HEAD – LITIGATION & OPPOSITION INTLL ADVOCATE

08 | June 2020

THE 20 PROMINENT

WOMEN LAWYERS TO WATCH IN 2020

Ms. Mamta Rani Jha A leading name in the ямБeld of IP law

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 09

T

he current era of digitization is leading to new technologies being created with every new dawn, and this has increased competition in every sector of the market. In this context, if you wish to benefit from an innovative idea, it needs to get protected from being copied in a palpable form. Protecting your intellectual property i.e. IP is the most vital thing in this competitive era.

The most important factor in protecting ideas is to get in touch with an IPR lawyer that can help you in all possible ways with 100% efforts. Ms. Mamta Rani Jha is one such leading name in the field of IPR. With over 17 years’ experience in the field of litigation, she has carved a unique position in the IPR landscape in India.

Ms. Mamta Jha, Senior Partner and Head – Litigation & Opposition at Inttl Advocare firmly believe in empowering her clients across various sectors by providing comprehensive, holistic, and innovative solutions at Inttl Advocare. In this article, we try to capture Ms. Mamta’s thoughts on her journey so far, the firm, her clients and her team.

Inttl Advocare – What makes it unique?

Inttl Advocare was established in 1991 by Mr. Hemant Singh, Managing and Founder Partner, who is also one of India’s leading IPR lawyers. It has offices in New Delhi and Mumbai. Mr. Hemant Singh has handled over 2500 IP litigation cases on various subjects 10 | June 2020

such as trademarks, copyrights, industrial designs, patents, etc. The firm has handled several landmark judgments delivered by Indian Courts in the field of IP. The Firm has a multi-jurisdictional practice in India, handling IP litigation and prosecution on all India basis and is one of the few IP law firms in India having significant expertise and experience in IP prosecution, enforcement, custom complaints as a part of a broad spectrum of professional services in the fields of trademarks, copyright, industrial designs, patents, domain names and cybersquatting, geographical indications, traditional knowledge, unfair trade practices, unfair competition, consumer protection laws, right of privacy and publicity, corporate laws, commercial documentation, foreign collaborations, transfer of technology agreement and franchising, strategizing IP protection, trade secrets, know-how and breach of confidence, technical collaboration, etc.

According to Ms. Mamta, the firm always introspects to give that extra advantage to the client. A lot of investment is made towards human resources, infrastructural robustness, industry awareness, building relationships within and beyond, following ethical practices, partnering with clients in terms of understanding, protecting and enforcing their IP, and collaborating with the team to catalyze their growth as well. Inttl Advocare is taking steps to have experienced persons with expertise in different fields, join the firm. The firm has converted itself from a Sole Proprietorship to a Partnership (Ms. Mamta being inducted as one

of the equity partners) making it truly a people’s firm and not a family-run firm. This motivates all of the firm’s members to always go one mile extra in their work, since they know that their efforts are recognized and rewarded proportionally.

The early days – Deciding to Join Inttl Advocare Ms. Mamta joined Inttl Advocare in 2007, after having practiced law for more than 7 years in various fields of law, such as constitution, land acquisition, service matters, banking and securitization, criminal matters, family disputes, etc. When asked about the challenges of the early day, she says that after having worked in several fields of law, she realized that being a woman, there are inherent challenges that one faces. Working as a woman litigator wasn’t easy in the year 1999 when she started her practice. The district courts, police stations, SDM offices were not so well-equipped as today and various environmental issues were faced, which compelled her to contemplate getting into a field that was challenging, intellectually stimulating and satisfying, for a litigator.

The field of IP, therefore, was an understandable fascination for her, being a science student with a gold medal in Zoology (Hons.). Also, Patent Law being one of the niche fields of IP, and requiring thorough knowledge in the field of science, attracted her to opt for this field of law.

After much groundwork and enquiry within the fraternity, joining Inttl Advocare became an obvious choice for her, because of Mr. Hemant Singh leading the firm,

who is a great litigator with sound knowledge and expertise.

She says, “I was fortunate to be selected by a very unusual interview by Mr. Hemant Singh, where I had no experience in IP and he had no experience in other fields of law! I guess my enthusiasm and knowledge of procedural aspects and some good luck made Mr. Singh give me an opportunity to be part of Inttl Advocare.”

As a complete beginner in the field of IP law, despite having experience in litigation, the expectations were high. She was aware that she had to go that extra mile so as to meet her own expectations. Her colleagues in the firm were very cooperative.

However, being a senior associate and yet a fresher in the field of IP, posed challenges of its own kind.

She never left office without completing her assignments. Ms. Mamta says “I still remember I would leave the office around 2.00 a.m. or 3.00 a.m. spending my time reading the briefs, researching, reading McCarthy, Wadlow, Kerly’s, Terrell, which are the leading commentaries on IPR Law. The office peon would drop me home on his bike in the wee hours of the morning. When I look back, I can only wonder how the same was ever done, particularly, when my daughter was two years old in 2007 when I joined Inttl Advocare.”

At this point, she expresses her gratitude to Mr. Hemant Singh who did not let extraneous considerations get in the way of her learning. Mr. Singh has always welcomed anyone who has the zeal and dedication to work hard. In fact, that is the foundation of Inttl

Advocare. The firm firmly believes in merit and talent, above all else. It is an equal opportunity firm with a culture of inclusivity, intuition, intelligence, infinite opportunity, and integrity. Ms. Mamta stated that “Today, I can only be grateful for the moment when I joined Inttl Advocare as a Senior Associate and now being Senior Partner. But for the philosophy of this firm, it was not possible for a person like me to grow, who is a first-generation lawyer, with no recommendation or godfather to back me up except sheer hard work and passion for my work.”

Her thoughts on the growth of the firm Since she has joined Inttl Advocare, the only core value of the firm has been quality work. The philosophy was that it does not matter how many hours are required, the deliverables to the client shall only be the best and nothing less!

Fortunately, unlike commercial law firms, the focus was not on billing hours but on quality. Since 2007, there has been no looking back and Inttl Advocare has grown from strength to strength, welcoming new clients every year. Because of the quality of work, Inttl Advocare has a prestigious clientele composed of industry leaders. It may appear that they have handpicked clients! Their work philosophy has attracted talented people to join the firm every year making them an enviable team, which is well-trained to deliver the best to their valuable clients. The trigger for growth of the firm has only been this philosophy of excellent quality and building an excellent team, to become par excellence in the field of IP.

The rising growth graph The firm was founded in 1991 by Mr. Hemant Singh with one junior and one paralegal. By 1993, the world renowned conglomerate Nestlé became the firm’s client and expansion began. In 2007, the firm had, Nestlé, Pernod Ricard, LG, Dabur, Hawkins, etc. as clients.

They saw growth in team strength as well. In 2007, the firm was operating from an office space in Panchsheel Enclave, which was soon outgrown, and thus, their first branch office in Sainik Farm was opened. The trademark prosecution team of almost ten persons shifted to Sainik Farm while the patent prosecution team (of 5 people) and litigation team (of 5 lawyers and 5 paralegals) continued from Panchsheel Enclave.

The firm continued to grow at a fast and steady pace and in 2012, the firm shifted to a consolidated office space at Express Trade Towers, Noida (the current head office) with a strength of about 50 persons.

They finally had all the departments together again! In 2019, the firm size became almost 90 persons, yet again requiring further expansion in terms of space and an additional wing was added.

Today, Inttl Advocare is a force to be reckoned with, operating from offices in Delhi, Noida, and Mumbai. 2020 is going to be a special year for Inttl Advocare, by meeting its target of being a 100 person firm!

Factors behind the long-standing growth of the firm According to Ms. Mamta, the firm believes in quality, hard work, inclusivity, intuition, intelligence, infinite opportunity, and integrity,

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 11

Cover story

“ The woods are lovely,

dark and deep, But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep'' -Robert Frost

“

all of which have led to the successful journey of the firm. Her experience has been that only those professionals stay on in the firm whose own philosophy resonates with these core values. The firm has a fantastic team, well-aligned with their vision and philosophy!

People at Inttl Advocare don’t believe in resting on past laurels.

They believe in treating every query, case, or client with a fresh perspective. They strive to understand what the client really wants and strategize their entire advice based on the client’s needs.

The environment in the firm is such that each member feels ownership of the work and takes full responsibility for whatever assignment given. The rest follows naturally!

Firm’s quality services Inttl Advocare is one of the few Indian IP law firms that offer a 12 | June 2020

broad spectrum of professional services in IP and allied fields, as discussed above.

The firm has a dedicated prosecution team comprising of experts in portfolio management, international filing, filing through Madrid Protocol, recordal of assignments, IP audits and transactions, Geographical Indications, and all other aspects of IP management.

Inttl Advocare also has a dedicated enforcement team that constantly provides unique solutions to emerging challenges with the changing technology. The firm handles matters at all levels of the judiciary, as well as actions before other authorities such as customs recordal and other border measures, cancellations, and oppositions before the Trade Mark Registry and the Intellectual Property Appellate Board, domain name disputes before the NIXI and ICANN. The

firm also has expertise in criminal enforcement and seizures.

Inpatent prosecution, the firm’s team comprises of technical experts who specialize in patentability analysis and claim drafting. The team has the unique distinction of working directly with R&D centers for patent portfolio development, non-conflict research, and patent protection.

What sets Inttl Advocare apart is that they believe in a holistic response that captures the client's immediate requirements, while being aligned with a long-term strategy devised for every client.

Managing a client’s prosecution and enforcement needs helps them be keenly attuned to the larger IP ecosystem that each client thrives in, and they have extended this approach to all clients, no matter which department works with them. As pointed out by Ms. Mamta, the firm has an open

channel communication between departments, overseen by the senior members who continuously learn from each other and in this process, create a template of best practices, dos, and don’ts unique to each client. This helps them avoid pitfalls for their client which comes from only looking at a problem from one angle. They also have firm-wide knowledge-sharing sessions that help them all keep updated with the nuances and latest developments in IP. Further, every attorney is encouraged to take on different assignments and they don’t believe that one person should end up doing only one kind of work. This keeps people motivated and they benefit from a fresh perspective in all their works. Members at the firm are confident of their culture and its success is evident in the fact that people who leave Inttl Advocare, often come back.

In terms of practice expansion, their Bombay office has further cemented its transition to allied fields such as corporate advisory, due diligence, legal metrology, food safety and standards, drugs and cosmetics regulatory affairs, corporate governance, FEMA. The firm regularly advises clients on these aspects.

While the core work of the firm remains IP, there is no restriction, if any professional has passion and expertise in any other field. For example, Ms. Mamta provides a lot of advisory and enforcement work in the field of insecticides, and also quaconstitutional issues, using her past experience to the benefit of the firm.

The firm also has seen patent

litigation grow multi-fold and they are proud to share that the firm has filed the highest number of patent litigation cases in India.

Prosecution-wise, they have also helped clients achieve their goal of the highest number of patent filings.

Change in diversity over the years in the IP sector Ms. Mamta says, “There has been a vast change in the field of law. I believe that 15 years ago, the IP field was relatively unknown and thus, confined to only a few lawyers. However, it’s one of the most sought after fields right now and there are so many more wellrespected faces around. We have women and first-generation lawyers who are at the top of the IP field, niche law firms, and several independent practitioners. We also see a lot of young lawyers opting for IP and it’s much more cohesive and established as a sub-field of law. IP is here to stay in the mainstream!”

Ms. Mamta Rani Jha Leadership in Legal Excellence Curiously, her tryst with the law was entirely providential. Being a university topper, she initially aspired to join the Civil Services.

Unfortunately, her brother met with an accident and sustained serious injuries, which changed the course of her future. She then decided to pursue law as a surer career choice.

However, this turn of events was only for the better, since she has never looked back!

Being a first-generation advocate, there was a lot of struggle in finding chambers to join practice. It was also a time when women

advocates were perhaps perceived less seriously than their male counterparts. At the time, she started out her career in the field of constitution and service law, at the chambers of Mr. V.K. Shali (later the Hon’ble Justice Shali of the Delhi High Court) who was a Standing Counsel at the time.

When she approached Hon’ble Mr. Shali for a position, he politely declined, stating that he had no room for anyone to sit. Perhaps this was a polite refusal, but in her youthful ignorance and enthusiasm, she replied that “I could stand and work”. Thus began a three-yearlong stint wherein she learned every aspect of the practice. For initial six months, Ms. Mamta undertook the only inspection of court records, which was something no other lawyer was willing to do, particularly since inspections at the time meant spending hours in dimly lit rooms, searching for and locating files, noting orders and thereafter waiting in line to type the same out.

She thereafter moved on to drafting pleadings and assisting seniors in Court. At this time, although women lawyers were relegated to the background, certain Judges were very encouraging of young lawyers, often insisting that the youngster argues in place of the senior. Her first appearance as an arguing counsel was a result of such an opportunity when the Hon’ble Justice Sikri of Delhi High Court called her to argue her case.

She says, “I still remember the thrill of thinking on my feet, and presenting my case before the Court! I would like to thank Hon’ble Justice Shali for the belief that he had in me and taking on a complete fresher.”

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 13

Cover story After learning the ropes, in 2002, she started working under the aegis of Dr. Surat Singh, one of India's leading jurists. Perhaps this was one of the greatest periods of learning in her career, not limited to the law itself. Right from dealing with clients, logistics, accounts, case management, researching, arguing, she was exposed to every aspect of firm management, equipping her with essential skills.

With Mr. Surat Singh, she dealt with constitutional, land, services, and administrative matters. Ms. Mamta was also part of the team that handled the famous Shivani Bhatnagar Case and other criminal matters, giving her invaluable experience in dealing with the Police.

In 2005, family life prompted her to opt for a Firm practice, in order to balance both aspects. She joined Mr. A Verma & Associates, where she worked extensively on banking and securitization laws, Bank auditing, SARFESI notices, etc.

In 2007, Ms. Mamta decided to concentrate on a niche field of law.

Considering her background in Science, she narrowed down to IPR laws and approached Mr. Hemant Singh, who is one of India’s leading IPR jurists, but at the time, had an upcoming independent practice. Under the aegis of Mr. Hemant Singh, she garnered extensive experience in IPR law, particularly in patent litigation.

Since then life has never looked back! From a modest beginning as a Senior Associate, Ms. Mamta presently is a Senior Partner and Head of the Litigation and Opposition departments. She has had the privilege of briefing stalwarts such as Mr. Gopal Subramanium and other seniors and 14 | June 2020

has benefited greatly from their wisdom and experience. It is truly a matter of pride and privilege to see Inttl Advocare become of one India’s leading IP boutique law firms.

better human being, and think towards contributing to society. I have the privilege of working with him and benefiting from his vast knowledge, expertise, and spirituality.” Ms. Mamta stated.

On other fronts, Ms. Mamta is a regular speaker at various IP fora and has also authored several articles on emerging and contentious IPR issues. Particularly, she had the privilege of authoring the India Chapter of the AIPPIWolters-Kluwer Practitioners’ Guide to Anti-body Patenting. She is also presently the Chair of the INTA Oppositions and Cancellations Sub-Committee, India Representative of APAA AntiCounterfeiting Committee, India Member of the AIPPI Biotechnology Committee, and India Leader – AIPPI Study Question on Inventorship of inventions made using AI.

The key achievements • Over 120 patent litigations with a 100 % success rate; • Several celebrated and reported judgments that are instrumental in the development of IPR jurisprudence as well as allied laws; • Arguing across the country, including in district courts and all High Courts of India, something that very few lawyers can claim.

• Authoring the India Chapter of the AIPPI-Wolters-Kluwer Practitioners' Guide to Anti-body Patenting

Her source of motivation She admires Mr. Hemant Singh the most, for being a mentor. He has been the toughest with her and is her biggest critic, but that is what has shaped her! He has always been there to teach, explain, encourage, and to allow her to be herself. Ms. Mamta says, “For me, the biggest strength he has, as a mentor, is allowing me to take contrary views either in office or in front of a client. This has allowed me to grow without any boundaries and be limitless in my thinking process. I will forever be grateful to him for being my mentor and making me what I am today.”

“This section would be incomplete if I do not mention another mentor, Mr. Gopal Subramanium, who has inspired me to work harder, be a

• Chairing the INTA Oppositions and Cancellations Sub-Committee and being a member of APAA and AIPPI A close-knit family of Inttl Advocare The firm has always been a strong believer in diversity, inclusion, and giving equal opportunity to all. Inttl Advocare has always encouraged talent and merit and nothing else plays a factor when it comes to giving opportunities. They pride themselves on their people, some of whom have progressed from being paralegals to Senior Associates in the firm. In fact, diversity and inclusivity have always been a norm at Inttl Advocare, rather than something to consciously strive towards. They believe that this is

‘‘ NEVER LET DOUBTERS OR NAYSAYERS STOP YOU FROM GOING AFTER YOUR DREAMS. THERE IS ALWAYS AN OPPORTUNITY FOR THOSE WILLING TO WORK TOWARDS IT! I WOULD ONLY ASK YOUNG LAWYERS, PARTICULARLY WOMEN LAWYERS, TO BELIEVE IN THEMSELVES. DON'T LOOK FOR SHORTCUTS, HARD WORK IS THE ONLY KEY. JUST KEEP GOING, MONEY AND SUCCESS WILL FOLLOW!

what makes them unique!

Overwhelming Client Experience

The members at firm are its strength and they spare no effort to help them grow and achieve their goals. Whether it’s the latest equipment, Human Resource services, special needs, infrastructure, and their members are their first priority. The firm regularly holds, skill-sharing and knowledge-sharing initiatives, open to all that contribute to the collective intellect. The Firm has several clubs such as the CSR Club, Sports, Event Management Club, Music, and Dance Club, all of which are open firm-wide and met with tremendous participation by all. At Inttl Advocare, they are a close-knit family.

The firm receives words of encouragement from their clients, every year and that is the ultimate reward for any professional. Ms. Mamta says the following valuable words from her clients are etched in her heart, • “She is our legal doctor and her opinion and approach is well-heard and accommodated whenever we take key legal decisions on some of our contentious matters and key litigations” • “You and your team have provided us with excellent service.

Frankly, the best of any firm in the world.”

• “As a client, we do feel the important involvement of Mamta in her work, her availability, and dedication, always ready to answer our queries and take care of our instructions, even late at night. She is a very nice and friendly person and contacts are very easy.”

• “Extremely engaged and willing to push the envelope insofar as interpreting existing legal provisions are concerned, which has been of tremendous value to us.

What has been of particular value to us is your ability to convey the correct risk assessment– we really appreciate this advice as it enables us to fine-tune our strategy in the best interests of the matter.”

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 15

Interview with The Enterprise World

T

here is an endless sky of opportunities in every sector. All one needs is a determination about the work. Law and litigation sector has always been forward to transform society.

With the new technologies, the world is getting closer, making many more opportunities and a boom in the business sector.

Where there is growth in any sector, there are disputes. To solve such disputes and maintain harmony, Ms. Kruti Desai is making smart and hard efforts via ALMT Legal.

In a candid talk with her let’s get known to ALMT Legal as well as her fantastic 15 years’ journey in the field of law and litigation.

• Tell us about the ALMT Legal ALMT Legal is a 20-year-old dynamic full-service Indian law firm that provides high-quality legal services and practical solution-oriented advice at reasonable fees. We have an established reputation as one of India’s top bracket firms for being a one-stop solution for our clients.

Currently, we have approximately 70 lawyers and 20 partners across two offices in strategic commercial centres of Mumbai and Bangalore.

Asialaw Profiles 2019 has recommended ALMT Legal for Corporate/M&A, Infrastructure, Energy, Real Estate, Capital 16 | June 2020

Markets, Labour & Employment, Private Equity, Tax and highly recommended us for Construction.

Corporate Intl Magazine has named us the ‘Employment Law Firm of the Year (India) 2019' and the ‘Cross Border Tax Law Firm of the Year (India) 2019’.

Asia Pacific Legal 500 2019 has recommended our partners and designated them as leading lawyers in various practice areas such as banking and finance, capital markets, corporate & M&A, dispute resolution, investment funds, labor and employment, real estate & construction, shipping, technology, media & telecoms (TMT) and tax.

Chambers and Partners Asia Pacific 2019 has also recommended several of our partners as ranked lawyers in corporate/M&A, dispute resolution, employment, private equity, and tax.

• What were the initial challenges you faced?

Personally, it has been a very smooth growth ladder for me. I was inducted in the firm in 2005 through the placement committee of Government Law College immediately after passing out of the 5 years course of BLS/LLB. Since then there has been no looking back and in 2012, I was made a partner of the firm. The initial challenge I faced personally,

was juggling between executing new and existing matters and keeping myself fully updated on legal developments. As a firm, our initial growth was quite rapid, though like in any business we faced challenges in matters such as price competition and poaching of trained associates by new entrants as well larger firms.

• Which was that point that triggered the growth of the Firm?

The years from 2004 to 2008 were the trigger years when the Firm acquired a lot of talent through lateral joinees of partners from different practices and practice areas. We grew from a 10 lawyer firm in 2004 to a close to 50 lawyer firm in 2008 and there has been no looking back since then.

• What is the reason behind your firm’s long-standing success?

I think there are multiple reasons behind our success: (1) we are a mid-size firm which gives a good blend of (a) a team of qualified expert lawyers along with (b) providing flexible rates; (2) we ensure that a partner/ senior lawyer having expertise in the required practice area is at all times involved on the matter and don’t believe in 100% delegation of work to juniors without experience; (3) we have dedicated teams for knowledge management and keep ourselves updated and proactively inform our clients in case of any relevant legal update that may impact them; (4)

we believe in closing a deal in the interest of both parties rather than getting stuck on petty issues; (5) We are a dynamic firm which believes in adapting to the need of the hour; (6) we are very approachable and open to feedback; (6) we are a one stop-shop for all legal solutions; and (7) we maintain a healthy work life balance that avoids burn out and keeps our lawyers constantly motivated and happy to come to work.

• What are the services the firm focuses on? How are your services different from those in the market?

Our practice areas encompass all aspects of Indian law and regulations including: ♦ Aviation ♦ Banking and Finance ♦ Capital Markets ♦ Corporate and Commercial ♦ Dispute Resolution ♦ Hospitality ♦ Immigration ♦ Infrastructure and Project Finance ♦ Insurance ♦ Intellectual Property and Information Technology ♦ Labour and Employment ♦ Media, Entertainment and Sports ♦ Oil and Gas ♦ Private Equity and Fund Structure ♦ Property and Real Estate ♦ Shipping and Maritime We have an in-house team of experts in some of the niche practice areas like labour & employment, tax, www.theenterpriseworld.com | 17

Interview with The Enterprise World and patents. These three practice areas are highly specialized and not common for all firms, which makes us quite unique and a full-service firm in the true sense.

• How do you decide to take the firm a step further in terms of your services?

We are hoping to continue our firm as the leading practitioner for labour & employment law which is growing rapidly in view of the tremendous amount of legal developments and updates in employment law.

challenges and debates.

• Can you please brief us about your professional experience?

My professional experience includes advising on domestic as well as cross border M&A and PE transactions, exchange control laws, IPR matters as well as advising extensively on labour laws involving hiring and firing policies, employee handbooks and policies, sexual harassment (POSH) compliances and dealing with complaints, payment of statutory benefits, retirement policies.

We also intend to be the number one go-to firm for insolvency matters which has seen a huge number of cases being filed since the IBC has come into effect.

We also intend to further expand our knowledge and practice areas in international arbitration.

We have also set up a dedicated team that will purely focus on emerging laws such as data privacy, competition, consolidated labour codes, etc.

• How have you seen diversity change over the years in the legal sector?

The legal sector has become more diverse in terms of gender, knowledge and emerging practice areas like competition law, insolvency, data privacy, labour codes, IPR, etc. Law is no longer about merely filing and arguing cases before the court which used to be the case many years ago.

Corporate law is constantly evolving and bringing up new 18 | June 2020

My field of expertise also includes advising on insolvency & restructuring of Indian companies, closure of liaison offices set up by overseas companies, IPR matters (trademarks, copyright, patent, etc.,) as well as commercial laws and contracts.

• What are the key achievements of your journey in the law and litigation sector?

Some of my key achievement over the years includes (i) being a recognized practitioner for Employment by Chambers & Partners (Asia Pacific) 2019, (ii) being recommended for Labour & Employment and IT Telco & (TMT) practice by Asialaw Profiles 2019 (iii) Co-authored the Indian Chapter of 'The International Comparative Legal Guide to Corporate Recovery & Insolvency’

2013 edition published by Global Legal Group Ltd, London, (iv) Being a guest speaker/ expert panellist at various events over the years e.g.: ♦ Guest Speaker on “Sexual Harassment: Complaint, Inquiry, Actions & Consequences” at the Employee Engagement Experience Summit & Awards, Mumbai 2018. ♦ Guest Speaker on “A Hands on Guide to Drafting Commercial Contracts” at the Contract Drafting Workshop, held at Hotel Orchid, Mumbai 2018. ♦ Guest Speaker on “Policy against Sexual Harassment” at ICFAI Business School Mumbai, 2018 ♦ Guest Lecturer on “Setting up Different Types of Entities” at Kirit P. Mehta School of Law (NMIMS University), Mumbai, 2018 • One person, who you admire the most?

I admire BK Shivani the most. She always has been a source of motivation for me.

It’s a lot of stress over there in the field of law. How do you cope with that?

Meditation is the best way to cope with any form of stress. I am a follower of Vipassana meditation and that is one of the key reasons for my success. Meditation brings focus, clarity, positivity, and strength to work hard. To give another quote of BK Shivani - “You cannot have a positive life with a negative mind. So turn all the negative thoughts into positive as much as you can.”

A New Approach To Modern Living www.panchshil.com

Interview with The Enterprise World

20 | June 2020

Patience, Passion and Perseverance are the three keys which stand in between success and failure. Imbibe them in your lives and you are bound to be successful. – Ms Shweta Bharti

H

ammurabi & Solomon is a multi specialty Law Firm, specialising in niche areas of law like Public Policy and general corporate commercial laws. As a Law Firm set up in the year 2001, they have come a long way. Presently they have more than 1000 Clientele, 100 Associates and 5 Offices across the country with aggressive expansion plans over this year. From a modest beginning to becoming one of the most preferred Law Firms, they have covered a long journey with consistency in Quality, following stringent time lines with every assignment being mapped by a Partner. The firm is structured to respond to the ever-expanding needs of its clientele.

While anticipating the future needs of these clients, the firm has focused on the developing areas of law. The attorneys and support staffs have all been carefully selected to provide clients with the highest degree of professionalism as a team responsive to the client’s legal problems and needs.

Over a period of almost 2 decades, they have tirelessly strived to attain the highest standards of “Excellence, Perfection & Commitment”.

In a candid talk with Ms Shweta Bharti, Partner at the firm, Lets discover her journey towards the success and the firm’s offerings in the law landscape.

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 21

Interview with The Enterprise World • What were the initial challenges you faced?

• What is the reason behind your firm’s long-standing success?

The initial challenges are common to all entrepreneurs including us.

The limitation of contacts and resources as well as the limited number of manpower pushed us to work extra hours in order to meet deadlines, the challenges of doing it right the first time in order to avoid multiple drafts being exchanged, handling the filings before the registry ourselves through the borrowed resources like other colleagues Court Clerks etc. Being the 1st generation Lawyers we had no back up to fall upon, no readymade Clientele to pursue further and thus everything was to be initiated from the scratch. There were days when we were not sure if we shall have sufficient work to handle the next day and there were days when 24 hours wasn’t enough to complete the assignments with our limited resources.

The one key reason for the Firm’s long standing success is the quality and timely delivery. We never compromised on either till date irrespective of the other challenges being faced by us. Further we have constantly worked towards building up a growth strategy along with identification of core-competency.

In today's highly competitive environment, it was very significant for us as a Law Firm to identify the USPs (Unique Selling Propositions). Thus, with a clearly defined strategy established and communicated, our USPs enabledus to differentiate us in the marketplace amidst others. We also kept a hawks eye on pooling in some of the best talents in the industry who are engaged, motivated and committed.

• Which was that point that triggered the growth of the Firm?

The Firm’s growth was almost instant and few Clients supported us whole heartedly. It was sometime in late 2001 that we handled one major litigation assignment which required us to engage the likes of Mr. Kapil Sibal and Dr. Abhishek Manu Singhvi.

The matter was very high stakes and it almost instantly brought us to the limelight. There were various high stake matters that we handled thereafter and briefed all the top line Senior Counsels in the process.

We had already peaked by 2004 when we felt the need for a bigger office and a bigger team, which was an indication of our fast growing success.

22 | June 2020

• What are the services the firm focuses on? How are your services different from those in the market?

The Firm being multidisciplinary focuses on various areas of practice, i.e., Dispute Resolution, Litigation, Insolvency, Real Estate, M&A, Contracts, Public Policy & Regulatory services, Indirect Tax, Anti-Trust and Competition Law and Data Protection. We also have a separate compliance division called HSSL Compliance Services which is rendering Compliance services through software tool.

The services provided by us are unique in the manner of delivery through impetus on strategy at all stages of the transaction. Our Policy and Regulatory Practice has been acclaimed both in the domestic as well as the global

market and we are winners of various awards as well for being the best Law Firm providing Policy & Regulatory Support in India (have been consistently recognised

by IBLJ for the past 8 consecutive years).

• How do you decide to take the firm a step further in terms of your services?

We have a young and committed team which drives and motivates us to improve upon our services. Our team is gearing upto the newer technological challenges being faced by the Law Firms in this fast changing environment globally. The increased reliance on technology is the need of the hour, when the world is shrinking into a global village.

Various automated processes are making certain areas of practice redundant and the ways of doing businesses are changing fast for our Clients. Thus Law Firms like ours are also moving at the speed of our Clients requirements and we are no longer working on 8 hours shift since the Clients have started demanding our availability 24*7 and thus unless we are technologically upgraded, it shall not be possible for us to keep pace with the changing times. We are also constantly working towards improving on our skill sets and also updating our systems and processes in order to consistently provide quality delivery to our

Clients.

• Is there any new addition to the list of services? Anything exciting you would like to share?

We are constantly evolving and adding the niche practice areas into our service offerings viz. Data Protection Advisory and Indirect Tax Advisory which are a recent addition. We are soon going to spread our wings at few other locations within our Country and are looking forward to our widespread reach and ability to cater to Clients at all those jurisdictions as well.

• How have you seen diversity change over the years in the legal sector?

Legal sector has always been a male bastion from time immemorial.

Women had to struggle their way into this profession. Women have always been considered as the softer sex and thus never found to fit into the rough, coarse and brutal legal profession. It is inspiring to read the stories of the women who fought their way into the profession like Cornelia Sorabji who became the first woman to practice law in th India way back in the 19 century.

It took almost 2 decades for her to be able to practice law in India.

However, over a period of time the legal sector has witnessed a paradigm shift and thus there are many more women entering the Profession now. Though the rigours

of the profession have kept the leaky pipeline on and many women lawyers do succumb to the needs of attending to their maternal responsibilities, but there are many others who have bravely been balancing the work and home needs. We have seen many women also opting for in-house roles and handling these roles with aplomb.

There is increasing number of women Judges now in courts and the time is not too far when there shall be an equal number of men and women Judges both at higher and lower judiciary. In fact at our office we have more number of women lawyers than men lawyers since gender is never a criteria for recruitment and we have witnessed women lawyers to be equally (and in some instances more) dedicated and committed to the profession.

• Can you please brief us about your professional experience?

I started my career in the late 20th century by which time there was already much more acceptability of women Lawyers in the Metro Cities. Thus even though the discrimination existed, it was subtle. The Clients would politely enquire if the case can be argued by my Husband (my Husband is an accomplished Lawyer, but was never into Litigation), the Judges would prefer to look at the male Lawyer arguing from the Opposite Side even during my arguments and so on and so forth. Thus the change in the mindset and acceptance of women Lawyers completely will take a few more decades, when the Client/Judge/Co-Lawyers shall look beyond the gender.

The key achievement’s in my journey in law and litigation has been aplenty, but the most encouraging of them is to be a role model for my children who unabashedly wish to follow my path to be a Lawyer. I have been mentoring young women lawyers entering the profession in order to enable them be prepared to handle all challenges that they may face in future.

In terms of professional achievements, every time a judge or a Client appreciates my work, I feel more motivated and encouraged. On one such occasion, after conclusion of an argument, the Ld. Judge stated that irrespective of the outcome of the matter, he was very impressed by the arguments put forth by me and the tact with which I handled his queries. Similarly, after the conclusion of argument in another matter before Court, the Client came to me and said that you fought well!! As a Litigator there are many such incidents which make the journey as a Litigator worth all the sweat, blood and tears that go into becoming one.

• One person who you admire the most?

One person that I admire the most is Late Justice P.N.Bhagwati. His life and his journey is truly inspiring. The very thought of allowing law reach the doorstep of a common man is heartening. The way Public Interest Litigation’s were permitted even by way of sending letters was a pioneer thought.

• What are the key achievements of your journey in law and litigation sector? www.theenterpriseworld.com | 23

The 20 Prominent Women Lawyers to Watch in 2020

Ms. Ameeta Verma Duggal Ms. Ameeta Verma Duggal Co-founder DGS Associates

E

very aspect of any business has benefited immensely from the rapid upgradations in the field of law and litigation.

The economic boost has created a vast demand for law and litigation services in the business landscape.

It is a need for businesses to get all the perfect legal solutions all together. Keeping this in mind, DGS Associates is providing comprehensive legal solutions under one roof and helping businesses to stand strong.

DGS Associates is a partnership firm that Ms. Ameeta Verma 24 | June 2020

Duggal co-founded with Ms. Niti Sudhakar in 2004. DGS is a boutique multidisciplinary law firm with a primary focus on international trade, corporate and commercial laws, serving domestic and international clients.

The corporate practice of the firm is complemented by a skilled team of litigating lawyers experienced in handling litigation in all for mediation and domestic and international commercial arbitration.

DGS’ clients benefit from the

expertise and experience of a large firm while still enjoying the personal attention, responsiveness, and accessibility of a small firm.

The firm simply believes that its success would come from its valuable clients’ success and DGS is committed to finding practical and cost-effective solutions for its clients.

Early Days of DGS Associates Ms. Duggal alongwith Ms. Sudhakar started this firm after leaving Associated Law Advisers (ALA) where she had spent almost

11 years. When they started DGS, the biggest challenge was that they did not have any client base. They first set up an office in a section of her house first and then set out to find work. They were very clear that they will not contact any of the clients they had worked with while in ALA. Since all her professional years were spent only in ALA this posed a challenge. But those initial days were fun and a huge learning curve. They have gathered considerable goodwill through the journey and that goodwill has helped them sail.

And the growth started…

Ms. Duggal says, “I think we just became confident with each new client and then we got a muchneeded impetus from a senior counsel in Kolkata, Mr. S.N. Mookherjee, with whom I had worked during my days at ALA. Mr. Mookherjee sent us work from Kolkata to the extent that we literally became the sole firm doing all the filings in the Company Law Board for Kolkata based companies. Added to this was my empanelment on the Central Government panel for the Supreme Court.” With the security of litigation work coming in, they could focus on developing the corporate practice and then in 2008, the international trade practice was set up. Thereafter, as they say, the

rest is history.

Interestingly, the graph has not changed for us significantly. We have always preferred to be a cohesive team of lawyers and prefer to function as a boutique firm. The firm strength has never exceeded 10-15 lawyers at any stage. However, what has been evolving is our periodic endeavour to add to our offering of services.

Factors behind DGS Associates’ long-standing success DGS is a relationship-driven firm.

Their responsiveness, personal attention to the client’s needs, candid advice and their ability to become part of the client’s management team has been their greatest strengths. Ms. Duggal says, “I think all our clients will vouchsafe for these. Even after all these years, Niti and I ensure that we are directly involved in matters and in DGS the buck always stops at us. Our objective is not to fail the clients who repose their faith in us.”

Transforming businesses with quality legal solutions DGS Associates’ primary areas of practice are export controls, international trade, including antidumping, safeguards, anti-subsidy, etc., strategic investments, mergers

and acquisitions, project finance, aviation, telecom, infrastructure, and regulatory practice.

Ms. Duggal focuses more on the firm’s export controls and sanctions, international trade, M&As, and regulatory practices and Ms. Sudhakar leads the firm’s practice areas of for corporate, aviation, telecom and infrastructure. DGS Associates envisage an increase in the areas of export controls, sanctions, international trade, and M&As and they will be focussing on growing their existing team in these areas.

Pioneering in the Pro-Quality Legal Services DGS Associates’ export controls and sanctions practice is a relatively new offering. In fact, for India itself, this is a new area of work and they are excited to be one of the recognized firms in this field of law. Last year, Thomson Reuters published DGS’s book on the Export Controls in India – Law, and Procedures, which Ms. Duggal co-authored with her colleague, Aditi Warrier. DGS Associates take immense pride in the fact that this is the only book on this subject that is available in India and is a great resource for industry, legal practitioners and students alike.

About the diversity change over

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 25

The 20 Prominent Women Lawyers to Watch in 2020 the years in the legal sector Over the years, legal sector has changed a lot with new innovations and upgradations. While talking about such drastic changeovers Ms. Duggal stated that “In my initial days, there were few women lawyers. Even in my own batch from the law faculty, not many women survived in the profession.

However, I perceive a dramatic change now with women taking up this profession as their first choice.

Law is a time-consuming profession, which has been a constant challenge for women lawyers as they continue to juggle between work and home. But now I find young women lawyers to be a lot more comfortable managing both ends and excelling themselves. Some of the most formidable names in our legal fraternity are women and that is phenomenal.”

Ms. Ameeta Verma Duggal, A solid Leadership Ms. Duggal is an unconventional lawyer who has always tread the unchartered path. As she says there has been no planning that has gone into charting her professional growth. Ms. Duggal says, “This has helped me a lot in exploring various areas of law, which may have been lost to me had I proceeded with a predetermined growth trajectory. I do not believe in compartmentalizing my practice areas and received encouragement to try my hands at various aspects of law during my years at ALA.” She started her professional career as a pure litigator and has continued to keep litigation as one of her practice areas. While she is immensely passionate about her work, she ensures that it never 26 | June 2020

deprives her of her love for travel so she strives to make work complement her travels to the extent possible.

She admires several people for the lives they have led and for their achievements. However, if to mention a single such person, she says she would choose someone who has been a direct influence in her professional life and that would be Lira Goswami, the founder partner at ALA. Ms. Duggal admires Ms. Lira Goswami for the person she is – a great legal mind; an ideal professional, employer and team leader. She has instilled in her the importance of hard work, dedication, and teamwork. Above all, she made her appreciate that we all have our unique strengths and we can be successful with grace and equanimity.

Ms. Duggal says Bill Gates has always been a source of motivation for her. What he created and more importantly how he has channelized his passion for philanthropic activities inspires her a lot.

DGS’ continued association with some of its main clients through their existence as DGS would be the biggest achievement. They have accomplished several firsts for their clients as they continue to work on the premise that there is a solution to every problem.

The happening work environment at DGS Associates DGS is all about teamwork and a work-life balance. They encourage employees to grow, professionally and in their personal space. Time efficiency is respected and deadlines can never be breached only bettered. There are no brownie points being offered for spending long and late hours at work. Key people have been trained to optimise the hours spent at work and they expect the same from employees. They would not hesitate to give credit where it is due and to accept responsibility if anything goes wrong. In all of this, the office runs with a personal touch and they all lunch together and celebrate all birthdays, festivals and everything else that requires celebration.

An Overwhelming Client Experience DGS Associates is a relationshipdriven firm. Over the years they have accumulated several friends who had first come to them as clients and continued to stay with them more as friends. One of DGS’ clients came to them after they had concluded a transaction where he was on the other side. Another long-standing client came back to DGS after having shifted to one of the top law firms as they could not get the same personalized attention.

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How to improve communication skills for better success Article 1

I

mproving your communication skills can gradually lead you to new heights of success. In today’s world of growing connections and information networks, it is necessary to know how to improve communication skills so that you stay ahead of the pack.

Communicating effectively with others means you have the ability to receive and relay information, a central asset that has leapfrogged and transcended today.

Effective communication depends 28 | June 2020

on your ability to listen carefully. A listener allows you to focus on all aspects of the conversation. An attentive listener allows you to focus on what is being said and to ensure that you understand your point without misunderstanding it.

It can make someone feel confident; make them feel like they are being listened to, and make the other party feel that they are looking to you for advice or guidance.

Learning to engage in conversation is a great way to improve your understanding. The key is to

understand how to ask questions whenever you feel you are missing out on a particular point. It shows that you are busy and eager to know what is going on. Try to use your other senses during ongoing conversations. The more you engage your other senses, the more closely you will understand the conversation.

During the conversation, try to answer instead of trying to answer.

Responding involves using your brain, usually answering makes you feel better. Responding allows you to control your emotions as you

carefully monitor what you say. On the other hand, the reaction gets things out of hand and the point of the conversation is lost. It is not intended to be effective.

The most important tip to improve communication skills is practice.

Discuss and socialize as much as you can. Practice listening carefully and contribute to the conversation.

A great way to work on someone's communication skills is to talk to friends and family, but this does not require serious discussion.

A toxic workplace often has

passive-aggressive leadership, destructive gossip, politics, and negativity to insult others. This can really benefit you when you are around this every day. It is essential to learn to separate the negativity that we are experiencing every day by moving away from the reality of who we really are.

If the means of communication in the organization are gossip, it is not a healthy practice and it cooperates from above that no one can trust.

The widespread lack of communication is a feature of most toxic workplaces. If one gets no

feedback on work whether it may be positive or negative, that can create hurdles in productivity.

It’s not about problems; it’s all about not getting the solutions. As a problem occurs there must be a solution for it. One should discuss finding solutions and not on who created the problem.

Good communication in the workplace creates a happier environment. All of us know that the Happier workplace is the most productive one!

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 29

Interview with The Enterprise World

30 | June 2020

MS SUBATHRA MYLSAMY COMMITTED TO SUCCESS

AK Mylsamy & Associates LLP has been rendering professional legal services for over 55 years now. Mr. A.K. Mylsamy started his independent practice in 1974 as a sole proprietary firm after being associates with Mr. T.Raghavan, a pioneer in Corporate Law practice in Chennai for over 2 decades as his junior. He converted the proprietary firm into a partnership firm with the joining of Subathra Mylsamy. In 2010, the Firm formally became a Limited Liability Partnership (LLP) with Mr.P.S.Suman coming onboard.

The firm is headquartered in Chennai and has offices in Bengaluru, Coimbatore and New Delhi.

In a talk with Ms Subathra Mylsamy, partner at AK Mylsamy & Associates LLP, let’s discover more about the firm and her thoughts about the law and litigation landscape.

• What were the initial challenges you faced?

While litigating in courts of law, the challenge was to prove and establish myself as a credible professional and be taken seriously in a male-dominated legal scenario.

It was an all-out effort to break the glass ceiling.

While not litigating in courts, the

challenge (like for any woman) is to multitask, whether it is at home or work. More importantly, the challenge is to run the organization professionally.

• Which was that point that triggered the growth of the Firm?

The joining of Mr. Suman and myself was the running point.

After our joining, the firm became a Limited Liability Partnership (LLP) and thus paving the way for corporate culture to be brought in to run and manage of the firm in more professional and efficient manner to improve client satisfaction.

• What is the reason behind your firm’s long-standing success?

The firm has been fortunate to enjoy long standing success due to strict adherence to its core values of operational excellence, integrity, adaptation of technology and constant updating of knowledge and skill sets. Its reputation is guided by its ability to build and sustain long term relationships with clients, made possible through a large team of professional and highly committed resources with access to an exhaustive range of knowledge sources. We have gained the ability to evaluate the implications of an ever-changing legal framework and help

organizations re-cast strategies to stay relevant and maintain a competitive advantage. Innovation has been the backbone of AKM. Constant updating of knowledge and practices of law through creative means such as our “one of a kind” online monthly Newsletter “The Law Tree” and our creative and innovative knowledge portal “ibccases.com” • What are the services the firm focuses on? How are your services different from those in the market?

We are a professionally managed Limited Liability Partnership (LLP) specializing in all aspects of Corporate and Commercial Law including but not limited to Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, Mergers and Acquisitions, Foreign Exchange, Intellectual Property Rights, Contracts, Real Estate, Arbitration and Mediation and Civil Litigation.

We believe that we are unique.

Over the 5 decades we have been in Corporate Law practice, we have built an outstanding reputation in various facets of Corporate law.

We deal with clients whose relationship with the firm goes back to generations. Along the way, our reputations for excellence and handling of our clients have enabled us to acquire a wide range

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 31

Interview with The Enterprise World

PARTNERS

of clients from a cross section of industries.

Board and Tax and Finance Experts.

The innovative spirit of the firm is showcased through “The Law Tree”, where legal knowledge is shared with the public in a simple yet interesting manner, once again reinforcing our positioning. We have been the first to launch the knowledge portal “ibccases.com” which covers through brief and incisive summaries of Insolvency and Bankruptcy judgments, the progress of IBC case law. Both Law Tree and ibccases.com are in-house efforts developed by a dedicated team.

A brief profile of the Advisory Boardmembers given below will highlight this cross section of excellence.

Our ability to provide well thought out and clear opinions on the most complicated legal matters are vastly enhanced through the presence of our advisory board consisting of luminaries from legal and corporate world. The advisory board consisting former judge(s) of the Madras High Court, Company Law 32 | June 2020

1. Justice M. Jaichandren, Former Judge of the Madras High Court with stellar experience in a range of cases – Civil, Criminal, Labour, Administrative and Debt Recovery.

He is currently the Chairman of Human Rights Commission, Pondicherry.

2. Mr. S.Balasubramanian, Former Chairman of Company Law Board, a luminary in the field of corporate law and arbitration besides writing and editing books on corporate law.

3. Mr. K.K.Balu, former Vice Chairman of the Company Law Board, a storehouse of experience and our think tank on corporate laws, arbitration, conciliation and mediation.

4. Mr.S.Ramanujam, senior tax

expert, an authority on mergers, de-mergers, and restructuring. He was the Executive Vice President, Group Taxation of UB Group, Bengaluru.

5. Mr. R.S.Mani, former group CEO of M.R.Kodandaram group (a member of MS Ramaiah group), an expert in banking, finance and insolvency matters.

6. Mr. Ashok Anantram, former Vice President of Sales and Marketing, ITC Hotels, who brings his experience in the hospitality sector to help us provide sound legal advice to our niche hospitality fraternity.

• How do you decide to take the firm a step further in terms of your services?

As a first step in taking our legal services to the next level, we have constituted the Senior Advisory Board. The Board and team bring their extensive legal and judicial experience to resolve the complex

problems that the clients face in their day to day operation of their businesses.

With pride we can say that we have one of the strongest Advisory team to give our clients both potential solutions to all their legal issues.

Our advisory team with rich and varied experience in mediation and arbitration provide excellent Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) solutions to resolve vexatious commercial and legal disputes our clients are faced with.

Understanding the importance of Insolvency and Bankruptcy in the context of Corporate Law practice, we have established a strong vertical of Insolvency and Bankruptcy practice for litigation and Advisory.

All these new initiatives are made without compromising our fundamental strengths in our core areas of practice viz., Mergers and Acquisitions, Competition Law, Contracts, Intellectual Property Rights and other areas of Civil Law. Professionals working or associated with our firm are constantly collaborating as a team to maximize the synergy of their combined contribution in achieving success for the client as well as the Firm.

We firmly believe that the ability to build and sustain long term relationships with clients is through constantly adding value to their operations. An integral component of “value addition” is the ability to positively scan the environment and evaluate the implications of an ever-changing legal framework and legislation. Some of these can

profoundly impact corporate performance requiring a recast of strategies to stay relevant and maintain a competitive advantage.

It is our endeavor to stay consistent with rendering quality legal services.

• How have you seen diversity change over the years in the legal sector?

There is a sea change in the legal scenario especially in the last decade or so. There is a paradigm shift in the perception of the law. It has moved away from litigation and moved towards conciliation, arbitration and settlement. The intention being to reduce real-time issues in courtrooms and provide more amicable solutions and the utilization of developments in technology to achieve the same.

Technology has, in a positive way, changed the entire landscape. Legal research that previously took days can be accomplished in hours now.

The increased use of technology is also providing a more level playing ground between the largest and smallest firms. Even the smallest legal firm is able to access the resources which were available earlier only to large firms. In short, technology has raised the quality of legal services to all clients.

• Can you please brief us about your professional experience?

It has been a roller coaster ride.

Having graduated in fine arts and completing masters in mass communication, I had planned to pursue my passion in mass communication as my profession.

However, owing to the health concerns of my father, it was up to me to take his legacy forward.

Hence, I qualified professionally as a lawyer. After doing my bachelor’s at Dr. Ambedkar University, Madras, I was firm on completing my master’s abroad and thus did by LLM in the University of Manchester, UK. While the education and training abroad widened my horizon and exposure to working in the west, it was a culture shock for me to practice in courts of law back home. The initial challenge was to establish my identity and individuality in a male-dominated Profession. I was determined to take up the challenge head-on. In living up to the rich legacy of my father, I took one step at a time. With patience and perseverance, I took the sole proprietorship to the next level – a partnership firm. With the on boarding of Mr. Suman, we then became a corporate LLP law firm in a span of a few years. As a woman, mother and entrepreneur besides being a lawyer, thinking out of the box and multi-tasking come naturally. Constantly working out of the comfort zone and willing to take risks, I am happy to have come this far in my journey as a woman and as a legal professional.

• The key achievements of your journey in the law and litigation sector?

I have strived, and continue to strive, to adhere to a high standard of professionalism, professional ethics, and quality in services that I render to my clients.

I believe that women are natural multi-taskers and try my best to leverage this capability in managing and running the Firm as a professional corporate organization while retaining the ethics and credibility. For example,

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Interview with The Enterprise World

I handle all issues related to human resources, recruitment, training and motivation, fiancé and system and also Business Development.

• According to you what nextgeneration women advocate and litigators should focus on?

Gen-next should be open to continuous learning. The ability to be on the learning curve forms the core of any professional career, especially a career in law. The rise to the top should be steady and consistent and not be determined only by money and fame.

Knowledge should be the core. All of us should embrace technology like AI which will take this industry to a new level and turn around the landscape of India.

• One person who you admire the most At the risk of sounding clichéd, it is my father Mr. A.K.Mylsamy. Be it as a parent or as a lawyer with humble beginnings and unblemished track record, he continues to inspire me to put my best foot forward. He is a role model amongst the legal fraternity for 5 decades now.

• It is a rat-race out there. How do you cope with that?

By not stressing out too much about it! By focusing solely on improvement, innovation and value addition to see how best we can take forward our Firm. Selfevaluating and competing with ourselves is the best way to deal with the rat race.

34 | June 2020

“IT’S BETTER TO BE A LION A DAY THAN SHEEP ALL YOUR LIFE.”

Upshot Metros

36 | June 2020

COLOMBO THE COMMERCIAL CAPITAL OF

Sri Lanka

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Upshot Metros

I

n the south of India, there is an island in the Indian Ocean bound by India, which is named Sri Lanka. The distance of the country is only 32 kilometers from India. By 1972, its name was Ceylon, which was changed to Lanka and in 1978 it was further changed to Sri Lanka by adding the word honorable Sri. Sri Lanka has had an unbroken relationship with India since ancient times.

Colombo is a capital and a largest city in Sri Lanka.

The city is a beautiful combination of new and colonial buildings. The history of Colombo is more than two thousand years old. There are many stories behind the name Colombo. According to one story, the name Colombo was first spelled by the Portuguese in 1505 AD. According to the second story, the name came from the Sinhalese word ‘kola-amba-thota’. In Sinhalese, the word means ‘port with mango trees’. According to another story, the word came from Cologne-Thota,

38 | June 2020

which literally means ‘port on the Kelani River’.

There are many places to visit here. The Galle Face Green, Viharamhadevi Park and the National Museum are some of the major sights here.

Colombo is a natural harbor; hence it has been associated with various countries since ancient times. Traders from Rome, Arabia and China have been coming here since 2000 years. The famous traveler Ibn Batuta came here in the 14th century. He mentions Colombo as Calampu. Arab traders began to settle here from around the 8th century. This was followed by Portuguese, Dutch and British respectively. Eventually the British captured this country in 1815 AD. In 1948 they got freedom from British Rulers and became an independent nation.

The Economy Sri Lanka has a historic prospect of progressing from a low-income country to a middle-income country in perpetual peace. Sri Lanka’s development has reached a critical stage. Sri Lanka is on track to become a mature middle-income country, with per capita income reaching $ 1.00 billion by 2010 and rapid economic growth, which has traditionally reached a high level of human development.

Port and cargo handling are major promises for the development of Sri Lanka’s economy. The government will benefit from the capital as it is closer to international shipping routes.

Sri Lanka has been lacking international shipping operations for the last two decades due to terrorist acts. As a result, foreign exchange gained less. The end of this conflict has given the Sri Lankan government an opportunity to invest in new port projects to increase the country’s GDP. Tea exports are in high demand. Other contributions in the country are positive weather patterns, proper use of fertilizers and economic recovery.

Apart from Hambantota Harbor, one of the largest fishing harbors recently is the government of the Eastern Province. The decision to build a port in the Eastern Province was taken by the government as part of a broader infrastructure development campaign aimed at improving quality of life and economic growth.

Sri Lanka’s tourism industry is improving after the war and showing a spectacular path since the end of

the war last year and the number of foreign tourists in the country has increased.

The reopening of the highway in northern part, devastated by decades of conflict, is leading to an economic revival, the mainland route that connects the southern mainland to the main Jaffna peninsula.

Among the promising enterprises in the region, the food processing and especially the canned fish industry has a large share.

The outbreak of Covid-19 has weakened the outlook as the already challenging macro-economic situation intensified due to low growth rates and significant financial pressures. Inflation remained subdued despite weak demand. According to the Colombo Consumer Price Index, the average annual inflation in June 2020 was 4.7 percent. The outbreak of free inflation and Covid-19 has prompted the central bank to cut credit policy several times in the first half of 2020 and bring policy rates down to 150 1,150. Basis points

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 39

Upshot Metros Must Visit Places • Vihar Mahadevi Park It is a public park. This beautiful park is in front of the Town Hall, built in the colonial style. The park is named after the mother of the famous king Dutugamunu. This park was built during the British rule. At that time this park was known as Victoria Park after Queen Victoria.

• Galle face green It is the most famous tourist destination in Colombo. It was developed in 1859 AD by the then British Governor of Sri Lanka, Sir Henry Ward. At that time this place was used for horse racing and golf play, besides the excursion. The original Galle Face Green covered a much larger area than the present.

• Colombo National Museum This museum was established on 1 January 1877 AD. It was founded by the then British Governor Sir William Henry George. This museum is in the Seenaman area.

The museum has jewelery and the throne of Sri Vikram Rajasinghe, the last king of Sri Lanka. The British captured Vikram Rajasinghe and captured Sri Lanka. The art gallery of this museum is not very rich. Here is a small collection of Sri Lankan handicrafts.

• World Trade Centre This twin building is the tallest building in Sri Lanka. Construction of this 40-storey building was completed in 1997 AD. This building is a major center of attraction for the tourists visiting here.

Seema Malakya Temple, Jami ul Alfar Mosque, Murugan Hindu Temple and Veera Lake are other places of interest in Colombo.

40 | June 2020

Interview with The Enterprise World

A

arna Law is a boutique practice, specializing in complex cross-border disputes and transactions. Though they are relatively young as a practice, their law practice legacy spans nearly a century which has taught them the importance of Excellence, Responsibility, Integrity, and Service to the Courts, clients, profession, and the broader ecosystem.

In an interview with Ms. Kamala Naganand, let’s discover the journey of the firm since inception and their offerings

find its path and grow.

• Which was that point that triggered the growth of the Firm?

We have always believed our practice will be a boutique and a collection of niche practices and we have not been in a rush to expand taking it slow and steady. It’s been a gradual and organic growth for us with new and diverse practice areas being added in, all of which have challenged and inspired us. Doing the work we enjoy, has always been a motivating factor.

• What were the initial challenges you faced?

• How have the Firm graphs changed since the foundation?

Can you share a few statistics?

We started out in a single room, at our ancestral home in Bangalore and have now grown as a boutique counsel led law practice with offices in Bangalore, Mumbai and New Delhi. Finding the right people who believe in the same value systems as us and who want to grow with us organically has been one of the major challenges.

Having said that, we have a great set of people working with us, all of whom have helped Aarna Law

What started in a single room with just Shreyas and me, have now grown to over 50 people (lawyers and non lawyers) spanning 3 offices. Opening the New Delhi and Mumbai offices, has been one of the most challenging and exciting things that we have done. We aim to be an India based international practice. Beyond India, I aim to act as Mediator for international disputes at Aarna ADR, Maxell Chamber Suites, Singapore.

42 | June 2020

• What is the reason behind your firm’s long-standing success?

The people we work with, the quality of advice we give and our main focus, which is our clientcentric problem-solving.

• What are the services the firm focuses on? How are your services different from those in the market?

The focus of the firm has always been on the client and what value we add to ensure the best possible outcome for our clients. India is a very price-sensitive market, so ensuring that the client feels like they are getting value for the services, that we are providing them with, is of utmost importance to us.

• How do you decide to take the firm a step further in terms of your services?

We are deploying technological resources across all our offices to enhance service capabilities and to swiftly respond to the changing needs of clients.

• Is there any new addition to the list of services? Anything exciting you would like to share?

We currently offer services in Litigation, Corporate Crisis Advisory, Pro Bono Publico, Mediation, Investment Arbitration, Commercial Arbitration, Intellectual Property, Real Estate Advisory, Mergers and Acquisitions, Maritime Law, Insolvency and Bankruptcy, Air and Space Law, Technology Law, Nuclear Law. Securities Law, Public Law, Fraud Investigation & Regulatory Investigation,

Anti-Bribery & Anti-Corruption, Asset Tracing Recovery, and Enforcement, Corporate Advisory across various industries.

• How have you seen diversity change over the years in the legal sector?

When I started my career in a traditional litigating firm, I was one of 2 other women in litigation in the firm. This is why, when we started Aarna Law, we were very clear that we wanted to be an equal opportunity firm and we ended up with 90% women on the team. We

have also proudly provided six months paid maternity leave and an additional six months without pay maternity leave and we offer paternity leave, striving to make the legal service industry more welcoming and accepting of diversity.

• Can you please brief us about your professional experience?

I read law at University law college, Bangalore and started out in a traditional litigating practice Sundaraswamy, Ramdas and Anandin Bangalore, after finishing

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Interview with The Enterprise World

my LLM in Intellectual property law from George Washington University. I then took a 6-year break to have my 3 kids and started Aarna law in 2013 with Shreyas Jayasimha. I trained as a mediator in 2017 and have since enjoyed the process of helping resolve disputes.

• What are the key achievements of your journey in the law and litigation sector?

I realised quite early in my career that I didn’t really enjoy the adversarial approach to dispute resolution, because it does not really help either party get closure.

With 90% of Indian businesses being family-run, I noticed a trend where it was always something else that needed to be resolved when people come to litigate. It was this search for an alternative, which led me to Mediation as a way of dispute resolution, which is much more effective in my opinion. Its kinder, gentler and finally helps resolve, but at the same time keeps familial and business interests at the forefront. I feel the biggest achievements in my career have been all the mediations that have successfully provided solutions to businesses and families and not torn them apart but brought them closer together. I have also enjoyed working with startups and building brands and growing new businesses in this competitive environment.

• How do you look after your employees? What makes your team unique?

I can proudly say that we have been 44 | June 2020

at the forefront of bringing women back to work. In India, where options in terms of child care are so limited and are mainly reliant on family, we made work from home a part of the firm’s environment. We hire women who have taken a break in their careers and are looking for an opportunity to be part of the workforce again. We have infrastructure built in to facilitate this and therefore, remote working was something everyone in the firm moved to very easily, even during the current COVID crisis. We also believe in investing in our people and have put in place, training programs to help develop leadership within the organization.

• Is there any special experience with your clients you would like to highlight?

I would like to share a quote from a client whom I will not name “Your team and your partner, have been the very best blend of professionalism and humaneness.

In the long run, it is these 2 aspects that will pay a rich dividend to not only your profession but personal lives.”

For me, this is the best compliment that I can get. We cannot forget that people come to us when they are in great trouble and anguish and my main priority is to deal with the issues humanely and reduce the impact that it is having on their lives and help make a difference to them.

• According to you what nextgeneration women advocates and

litigators should focus on?

The things people should focus on are: Quality: providing the best possible outcome for the client, Working ethically and Being an agent of change.

• One person, who you admire the most?

My grandfather Late Mr.S.G.Sundarswamy who is looked upon as a doyen of the Bar and whose standards of ethics and service are still spoken about by people even to this today.

• Whose business story do you find the most inspiring?

The Bill and Melinda gates foundation have made such a huge impact on humanity. I find their story of selfless giving of themselves, their time and creating opportunities extremely inspiring.

• It’s a rat-race out there. How do you cope with that?

I am not part of any race. I only hope to be a better lawyer and a human being every day.

INNOVATION, BEYOND IMAGINATION

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Interview with The Enterprise World

A

lawyer is the one who helps the neediest one in society. The law is the last hope for many people who are tackling the critical problems. Commercial disputes are always been a speed breaker for the growth of businesses. No matter what business you are into such disputes may hold your growth back. At such a crucial time all you need is a lawyer you can trust on.

Ms. Anupama Hebbar is a lawyer with vast and diverse experience who can be an obstacle breaker for your business. She has been transforming businesses from long through the firm Keystone Partners - Advocates and Solicitors.

Let’s have a talk with her and get known to her journey towards the prominence and the firm’s quality offerings in the landscape of law and litigation.

• Tell us about the firm.

Keystone Partners is a specialist dispute resolution law firm with offices in Bengaluru, Mumbai and New Delhi, and expertise in arbitration and civil and commercial litigation. The firm comprises a young, enterprising and highly qualified team of 30+ lawyers, with experience across a diverse spectrum of subjects. Our firm was recognized in 2018 as the Best Law Firm to Work At, in a survey of 1000+ professionals conducted by Vahura. Our firm has also been ranked among the leading Dispute Resolution practices in India by Legal 500, Benchmark Litigation, and the Indian Business Law Journal.

46 | June 2020

• What were the initial challenges you faced?

The Firm is mainly formed of lawyers with no family background in law. Therefore, in the initial few years, attracting clients was an uphill task. But due largely to an incredibly talented pool of partners and associates, we were able to slowly, but surely make our mark.

• Which was that point that triggered the growth of the Firm?

The founding partners of the Firm started off under the name of Naik & Srikumar in Bangalore in 2010.

We then started offices in Delhi in 2010 and Mumbai in 2014. The Firm in its present form was formed in 2014. The pan-India offering the Firm was able to offer around this time gave a significant impetus to our growth. Due in large part to the repute that the partners had built both before and during their time at Keystone, we were entrusted with some very interesting work - some of which have been in the public eye. These

matters have given the practice a shot in the arm.

• How have the Firm graphs changed since the foundation?

Can you share a few statistics?

The Firm has had a very steady growth trajectory since its inception. We have been very selective and cautious in our hiring strategy with a key focus on quality and maintaining the work ethos we've worked hard to build. Since 2014, we have grown at the rate of about 5 lawyers every year and are presently about 35 lawyers strong.

• What is the reason behind your firm’s long-standing success?

It is without a doubt the talent pool of colleagues across our offices. We have very rigorous hiring practices.

This ensures that our clients have the best legal advice, irrespective of the level of associate they are interacting with.

• What are the services the firm focuses on? How are your

Ms Anupama Hebbar

Compassion is the radicalism of our time – Dalai Lama

Ms. Anupama Hebbar Partner

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Interview with The Enterprise World services different from those in the market?

The thing that differentiates us from a number of other firms is that we are an exclusive dispute resolution and advisory firm. We have offices and tie-ups across India and can advise on a wide variety of disputes, in almost any jurisdiction.

We are modelled as a professional law firm and not as a law chamber, which is traditionally how dispute resolution practices have worked across India. Clients appreciate the professional approach we bring without the trappings of a large corporate law firm. The structure also encourages lawyers within the firm to work harder knowing full well that there are no glass ceilings.

Additionally, the partners at the firm each have their area of specialization making us a firm of many specializations. Senior Associates at the firm are also actively encouraged to subject area expertise after they have spent a number of years gaining familiarity with the wide range of dispute resolution services offered by the Firm. The knowledge and experiences are constantly shared within the team, and matters are staffed with this expertise in mind, to ensure that the clients of the Firm always receive expert input to their specific needs. I think this mix of sector-specific specialization built on a broader experience base gives us an edge.

• How do you decide to take the firm a step further in terms of your services?

The Firm is constantly looking to innovate and improve its services.

For instance, we are presently working with a start-up, Centre for Online Dispute Resolution (CODR) looking to build an online dispute 48 | June 2020

resolution platform. This helps us stay ahead of the curve and have a sense of the future of dispute resolution. This, in turn, equips us to better tailor our offerings to suit the needs of clients.

• How have you seen diversity change over the years in the legal sector?

I have been in practice for 11 years now and I do not think the diversity has increased noticeably in the judiciary or in the wider bar during my time. I do think law offices (including us) have made internal changes and active efforts to be diverse and that will hopefully also result in a more inclusive bar and bench.

• Can you please brief us about your professional experience?

I graduated with a B.A.LLB. (Hons.) Degree from National Law School of India University in 2008 and was admitted to the bar in the same year. I am also admitted as a Solicitor, England & Wales (currently non-practicing), after having completed my training contract at Simmons & Simmons, London. I worked with Indus Law in their Dispute practice for many years before moving to Keystone Partners as a partner in 2015. I have handled matters before a wide variety of fora including the Supreme Court, Karnataka High Court, NCLT and trial courts. I have a particular interest in, and regularly handle matters relating to insolvency, intellectual property rights, privacy, and public law.

• What are the key achievements of your journey in the law and litigation sector?

I think the greatest recognition for me came when the High Court of Karnataka selected me to be on the

panel of lawyers advising the Official Liquidator of Karnataka.

They thought I would be a good fit after seeing my work in commercial disputes. This is heartening because women lawyers are seen as advising mainly on issues of family law and the number of successful commercial women lawyers in Bangalore is in single digits. I was also was ranked as one of the top three upcoming law firm partners in India in the field of Dispute Resolution by an independent survey conducted by Vahura in 2018 and named as a Dispute Resolution Star by Benchmark Litigation in their 2019 Asia Pacific rankings.

• How do you look after your employees? What makes your team unique?

We encourage openness and camaraderie within the team. There are no glass ceilings within the firm and associates are encouraged to participate in their own and the Firm's overall growth. We have very low attrition rates (we must be doing something right!) and have won recognition as the Best Law Firm to work at within our category • According to you what nextgeneration women advocates and litigators should focus on?

I would encourage young lawyers to consider public law as an area of practice, and not have a blinkered vision of big money and commercial disputes. It is imperative that, on key constitutional questions, the youth bring their perspective and push the change that the country needs.

Dispute Resolution has always had the reputation of unprofessionalism - young tech-savvy lawyers can change this.

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The 20 Prominent Women Lawyers to Watch in 2020

Ms Anita Dugar Ms. Anita Dugar Principal Associate

F

or years, the Indian legal profession, particularly litigation has been dominated by men, and most of the new law firms that rose in the nineties were headed by men. Some of the firms that have struggled the most to increase diversity at the top have also been making strides recently to address the deeper issues. Despite the increased emphasis on diversity and inclusion within the legal field over the past decade or so, the legal profession remains one of the least diverse of any profession. Hope, this will change shortly because women 50 | June 2020

leaders in different sectors including the legal profession have proved their mettle time and again through their work and leadership qualities.

Ms Anita Dugar is one of such women influential lawyers, who made her unique position in the law landscape by providing quality and determined law services through the firm Samisti Legal.

The Firm Samisti Legal is an emerging Corporate and Commercial Law firm based out of Hyderabad,

Telangana. Samisti was founded in Jan 2015 by Raghu Babu Gunturu and Prashant Jain with an aim to provide comprehensive range of Legal and Compliance services with high professional standards.

Prashant heads Samisti Legal. The team consists of interdisciplinary professionals like advocates and company secretaries who together leverage their knowledge, expertise, and experience in providing quality legal services.

Raghu brings in strategic direction to the firm, mentors the team, challenges the status quo to better it what they do constantly, introduces

new practice areas, etc. Ms Anita had joined the firm almost since its inception and have been leading the execution team since then.

Samisti presently has a rich client base of well-established companies, institutionally funded emerging businesses and has also been servicing start-ups and incubators.

Wining over the initial hurdles Samisti was founded as a mid-segment law firm and to survive in that space was no simple task. They had to pave their way amongst the top law firms and the small individual players. The biggest challenge for them was to create their visibility in the market for which they did a lot of effort.

The firm explored tie-ups with International firms, engaged in thought leadership by writing articles on their practice areas, hosted insightful seminars for founders on legal topics, undertook speaking opportunities and accepted diverse nature of assignments even if it called for a lot of studies and learning on their part. They also initially found it a challenge to convince the corporates on pricing as they were very sensitive about it irrespective of the quality of work that they offered.

An initial couple of years being tough, were more towards laying a foundation, while there was an exponential growth during the subsequent years due to the good work recognized by clients and spread by word of mouth to other.

The firm now renders its services not only to clients spread all over India but also to international clients engaged in diverse businesses. The firm has a long way to go but they have a clear

direction.

Partnering for the growth, together Quite a few clients in Hyderabad were being serviced by laws firms from Mumbai remotely which had its own limitation and inaccessibility hence there was a clear gap in the market for mid-segment law firms to come up where corporates could get good professional legal advice. With this background, ‘Samisti’ was formed.

Samisti could very well bridge this gap with its quality service offering and that triggered the growth of the firm.

Samisti means United or together, whatever they do, they would like to keep their interest aligned with other stakeholders who could be a client or an employee who are their biggest stakeholders.

The rising graph of growth The firm has grown multi-fold since its inception in all areas inter alia, headcount, revenue, client mix (domestic/international/sectors) diversification of work, etc., After a humble start, they grew almost 2X on a year on year basis, which was a great boost to their confidence clearly portraying that their efforts were in the right direction. The firm does meet periodically to review their existing performance and to lay the strategic road map for the coming years. While they continue to aim that they achieve their projected numbers, the firm’s priority is to add value to the clients, their employees and the various stakeholders of their ecosystem.

Factors behind the long-standing growth of Samisti A few characteristics which set

them apart are hands-on approach, deep involvement with the clients to understand their commercial intent, thereby adding value to the transaction. The firm’s quick turnaround time in delivering the client requirements, rendering quality services and their easy accessibility to the clients have played a very important role in the success of the firm within a relatively shorter period of time.

They also focus on and continue to track and learn about evolving business models, best practices, global trends in technology and changes in the legal landscape for business.

Their quality offerings The firm has been doing decent work in transaction advisory space specifically with regard to capital raising, Mergers & Acquisitions, Insolvency and Bankruptcy, and General Corporate Advisory matters. Besides firm has been advising clients on business set up in India, corporate law compliance, foreign exchange laws, etc., Samisti has never compromised on its service quality and the team believes in giving its best irrespective of the commercial consideration which clearly sets their apart from the others in the market.

As a result, Samisti has established associations with various overseas clients and informal affiliations with overseas law and accounting firms for rendering legal services in the USA, Japan, and Australia. This has helped Samisti to garner valuable insight into various legal and commercial needs of overseas clients.

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 51

The 20 Prominent Women Lawyers to Watch in 2020 Ms Anita Dugar, A visionary leader in the field of law Law is a tough profession. it has its own particular challenges. To be a woman in that environment is especially demanding. Initially, she had not planned to pursue law as a profession and she finished her Company Secretary course and was working in a listed company as a company secretary but soon it all seemed very monotonous and she wanted to learn about new and various facets of law and this made her switch to a law firm.

Fortunately, she landed with a job at one of India’s most reputed law firms. It was then that she started studying law and finished her law degree. Ms Anita worked with the law firm for 4 years and then shifted to Hyderabad where she joined Samisti. Ever since she has joined, each day in Samisti has been a day full of challenges, opportunities and lots of learnings.

Over the years she has extensively worked on matters relating to corporate and commercial laws, start-up/angel funding, Private Equity Transactions, acquisitions, Joint ventures, mergers, de-mergers, representations in NCLTs for merger matters.

Throughout her professional journey this far, she has received immense support from her family which has really helped her to grow in this profession. Samisti has also played a very important role in helping her maintain a work-life balance by providing flexibility in working hours and also giving work from home facility which was particularly important especially after embracing the motherhood.

The achievements Working with minimal assistance 52 | June 2020

on complex transactions and receiving appreciation and acknowledgment for the same from the clients has been truly inspiring.

They have been frequently receiving appreciation for their commitment and work from their clients in the form of testimonials that they truly value. These testimonials inspire them to do better.

The happening work environment Samisti being a professional services firm, they very well understand that employees are the biggest assets. The firm take various initiatives for employee training, provide exposure and improvement opportunities through hands-on experience, give them the autonomy of decision making and ingrain in them the values of the firm so that they are well equipped to handle work independently in line with the firm’s objectives. The Firm strongly advocates its employees to maintain work-life balance and gives them the

flexibility while shouldering the ownership of their work.

About the rat race in the market Continuous learning on the job while working on the transactions and off the job learning by keeping track of the new developments in the legal landscape, learning about different business structuring models and being updated on the rapidly changing laws in India.

Samisti, taking a step forward with Increasingly sophisticated legal technology will become a baseline expectation for clients, with automated due diligence already making an impact on deals. In many cases, the quality and accuracy of AI-powered due diligence could accelerate deal settlement and lead to a better outcome. They would be focusing on and investing more in this. The firm is prepared for radical changes in staffing profiles, recruitment, retention, graduate education, and continuous development. As the legal sector is now a prime target for potentially disruptive new entrants, often coming from outside the sector. This reality calls for a systematic approach to scan for such potential developments and identify, embrace and pre-empt new entrants through collaboration and competition.

Samisti is a boutique firm and they focus currently on transactional work. In the next 5 years, they are aiming to be a full-service law firm with branches in all major cities.

www.royalenď€ eld.com

Interview with The Enterprise World

L

exCounsel is a corporate, commercial and litigation law firm with offices in New Delhi, Bhubaneshwar, Odisha and associate offices in major cities across India. It provides comprehensive legal services to a broad spectrum of domestic and international corporations. The firm is recognised as a leading law firm and advises in diverse areas including Mergers & Acquisition, Corporate and M&A, Labour and Employment, Real Estate, Venture Capital & Private Equity, Education Laws, Defence & Aviation, Franchising, Media & Entertainment, Dispute Resolution, Insolvency, Software/Information Technology, General Corporate and Commercial.

Founded on best international practices, coupled with the strong capabilities and experience of its founding members, Seema Jhingan, Alishan Naqvee and Dimpy Mohanty, LexCounsel provides comprehensive legal services and solutions on cross border and domestic corporate and commercial matters. The Firm has substantial expertise and in-depth sector specific understanding and knowledge to provide customized and highly effective legal advice best suited to the clients’ business needs, be it simple or complex multiparty transactions. In recognition, the founding partners of the Firm have been consistently nominated as “AsiaLaw Leading Lawyers” in their respective areas of practice, particularly in IT, telecommunications and media, venture capital and private equity and labour and employment.

54 | June 2020

The Firm is equipped with advanced technologies, management resources, updated library systems and other dedicated support systems to ensure timely delivery of legal services. With a close network of offices at New Delhi and Bhubaneswar, Odisha (led by Abhijeet Das, Partner), and associate offices at Mumbai, Bangalore, Kolkata, Chennai and other major cities, LexCounsel draws on the specialized expertise of several professionals and specialists to provide seamless complete legal business advise throughout India.

LexCounsel has been regularly recognized as a leading firm in several areas of practice including, Corporate and M&A, Tax, TMT, Dispute Resolution, Aviation (including defence and aerospace), Real Estate and Construction and Labour and Employment [Sources include: Legal 500 and Asia Law and Practice, a Euromoney publication]. LexCounsel has also been recognized as a Tier 2 M&A advisory firm by ALB in 2019.

LexCounsel’s litigation team led by Alishan has been awarded as the ‘Dispute Resolution Firm for the www.theenterpriseworld.com | 55

Interview with The Enterprise World Year’ by BW Business World Legal Awards, 2019.

Ms. Seema Jhingan has over twenty-five years of experience.

Seema has been recently recognized as the “Partner of the Year – Overall” by the BW Business World Legal Awards.

Seema has also been honoured by the Corporate Counsel Association of India in 2019 for her contribution to the Indian legal fraternity as “Shining Star of Indian Legal Fraternity” and as one of India’s “Trusted Corporate Lawyers of 2017” by the Indian Corporate Counsel Association in its publication – ‘The Vanguards’.

Seema is a nominated Private Equity member of IR Global, one of the world’s largest professional network.

In a talk with Ms Seema Jhingan, lets discover more about the LexCounsel and their journey since the inception.

• What were the initial challenges you faced?

Individually, when I started my career at a young lawyer in 1994, there were fewer women lawyers and somehow the vibe I got was that lady lawyers are good as junior associates’, but men are preferred as the senior arguing counsels in courts. After a year in litigation, I found my true calling in corporate, commercial and transactional law which I enjoy a lot even to date.

The Indian economy was opening post the new 1991 industrial policy, and the country was beginning to receive many foreign investors.

Considering the plethora of laws and being totally new to foreign exchange rules and regulations, it was quite challenging to support large clients in their investments in 56 | June 2020

India. I recall many sleepless nights and work pressures of advising the clients and supporting my seniors correctly. But it was overall a great learning experience.

My partners and I started LexCounsel in 2004 as a small firm with little resources, support or affiliations, no clients or premises/infrastructure and since then we have grown in size, clients, team and reputation.

• Which was that point that triggered the growth of the Firm?

Unrelenting hard work, resilience, hopefulness and delivery of quality work triggered a lot of referrals from existing clients. Consistency in work, business-oriented advice and attentiveness to details earned many clients for the Firm. The Firm’s expertise in niche areas such as satellite and telecom work, education, healthcare, clinical trials and biotechnology, food laws and insolvency and bankruptcy practice also helped in meeting more potential clients. Alishan Naqvee’s commitment to lead the dispute resolution practice and Dimpy Mohanty’s focus on labour and employment and sexual harassment matters also contributed to the strengthening of the Firm’s practice areas. Rather than a particular point being the catalyst for growth, I believe it is the ongoing consistent quality work that continues to trigger the growth of the Firm.

• How have the Firm graphs changed since the foundation?

Can you share a few statistics?

The Firm started with 4 lawyers and we are currently 35 lawyers across India with own and associate offices across India. From a one room office to now a full building office we have not only grown in

space and infrastructure but also in practice areas.

• What is the reason behind your firm’s long-standing success?

A strong team, dedication to quality services, responsiveness to clients, readiness to meet clients’ business requirements, building trust with clients and associates who enjoy working with the Firm and competitive billings helped the Firm to continue its growth trajectory.

• How do you decide to take the firm a step further in terms of your services?

We are planning to set up more offices across India to expand our practice. The Firm is already a member of three international organizations viz, IR Global, International Lawyers Network and Alliott Group. The members of the Firm regularly attend the annual conferences and regional meets of these groups to meet lawyers and professionals from across the world for learning best practices, client referrals, firm development and management.

• Is there any new addition to the list of services? Anything exciting you would like to share?

The Firm has added the Insolvency and Bankruptcy practice in the recent years. The Firm’s strong education practice advises K-12 and higher educational institutions from across the world. Clinical trial and healthcare continue to be strong practice areas. Advise on crypto currency is another new exciting area.

• How have you seen diversity change over the years in the legal sector?

From the time I started my career

in 90s (when there were lesser practising women lawyers) to now, more women have joined legal field. The legal field is now more diverse with many corporate, litigation and niche practice area firms. With more law colleges, students from tier 2 & 3 cities are also aspiring to be corporate lawyers.

• Can you please brief us about your professional experience?

Being deeply passionate about law practice, I follow the new developments in law keenly. I started my practice with Singhania & Co, followed by Titus & Co and then co-founded LexCounsel in 2004.

I continue to lead the corporate commercial practice of the Firm and greatly enjoy advising clients in complex legal matters, business structuring and transactional matters. I love interacting with entrepreneurs at conferences where I speak regularly.

• How do you look after your employees? What makes your team unique?

Our strong legal team is the backbone of our quality services.

Connectedness with associates is crucial as legal work is a teamwork with long hours of work. Firm lunches and dinners, get-togethers and celebrations help in team building but empowering our associates in client handling, court appearances and delegation keeps the team strong and together.

Our team is unique in its flexibility to appreciate the specific business need of the client, its in-dept understanding of business law and industry, its deep research and law interpretation skills and litigation

strategy and execution.

• Is there any special experience with your clients you would like to highlight?

There are several client experiences which are special. For instance, in our representation of Pilatus Aircraft, Switzerland, the client included us in the first delivery of Pilatus trainer aircraft to Indian Airforce by sharing with us the presentation of the delivery ceremony at our offices. Similarly, Protostar, a US satellite-based company involved the Firm in launch of its first satellite as an appreciation of our hard work in the matter. Usha Breco, the Firm’s long-standing ropeway client engaged the Firm as its representative for media handling on safety protocols of the ropeway.

• According to you what next generation women advocates and litigators should focus on?

Bring passion and devotion to your work regardless of whether you are pursing litigation or corporate practice. Never bring or let others bring gender to your profession.

Since beginning, I have seen myself as an advocate and never as a woman advocate. Majority of the barriers, excuses and roadblocks are in our minds, fight against them.

• One person who you admire the most?

Professionally, Zia Modi (Founder AZB) and personally, Mahatma Gandhi and from recent times, Sudha Murthy.

• Whose business story do you find the most inspiring?

There are several stories that are inspiring and not one. I find inspiration from everyday life and

people, their struggles and perseverance to fight daily hardships and achieve smaller goals. Stories of ordinary human beings who strive hard in business, adopt technologies and innovate on small scale basis, be it in agriculture, water conservation, charitable work are all very inspiring. Business stories of Steve Jobs, Narayana Murthy, Kiran Majumdar Shaw, Bill Gates are equally inspiring.

• Which is the most inspiring quote you have read?

‘Power of being Present in Now’ by Eckhart Tolle is one of the most powerful quotes that I live by and strive to achieve. The ability of mind not to engage in make believe stories/fears and being fully present and alive in the present moment is the key to mental sharpness, conscious behaviour and happiness.

• It’s a rat-race out there. How do you cope with that?

Law is a tough field and requires long committed working hours with loads of deliverables, opinions, fillings, arguments and submission and can be sometimes challenging.

To avoid stress and anxiety, it is advisable to enjoy the work and bring purpose to ones’ everyday work. One needs to ‘cope’ only if the work is forced and without internal motivation. Personally, nothing motivates me more than serving a client’s purpose in achieving its goals. Also, keeping some downtime for self with family, yoga/exercise, travelling and books are great stress busters.

Inculcate hobbies, balance would not be far behind.

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Did you Know?

DID YOU KNOW?

58 | June 2020

Women always speak an average of 20,000 words every day, which is not 1000 or 2000, but 13000 words more than the average of men.

Iceland is the happiest nation. The only country that does not have an army.

11 percent of people in the world use the left hand.

The rst mobile device named iphone was not Apple but Cisco Co. Was made by His job was to use Skype’s voice functionality without using a computer.

Can anyone be lucky enough to survive an atom bomb attack, that too not once or twice… It is hard to believe but Sutomu Yamaguchi of Japan is one such lucky person.

A bridge was built in The Hague city of the Netherlands only to allow squirrels to cross the highway without danger.

You will be surprised to know that the catalog of IKEA store selling furniture and home accessories holds the record for the most printed book in the world. It prints 200 million copies every year in about 2 dozen languages.

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 59

Interview with The Enterprise World

AMLEGALS was founded by Shri Anandaday Misshra, Advocate way back in the year 2005, as Mishra Associates. It started the journey from Ahmedabad in the State of Gujarat, India. Gradually, it re-branded itself as AMLEGALS in the year 2012. It is functioning as a multi-disciplinary, Specialised Law Firm. At present, it operates with its own offices in Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Kolkata, Bengaluru, and New Delhi. The Law firm operates in 14 cities of India through its associates and affiliates.

The firm also has close international associates in China, Singapore & UAE. In a candid talk with Ms. Easha Manchanda, Associate at the firm let’s get inspired from her journey towards the success and what AMLEGALS offers • What were the initial challenges you faced?

The challenge was expansion and going to new places but our commitment to services and results for the clients made our task easy to grow further.

60 | June 2020

• Which was that point that triggered the growth of the Firm?

The trust of our clients encouraged us and triggered us to expand our working to new places. This has resulted in our growth which has taken us to places like Mumbai, Kolkata, New Delhi & Bengaluru.

Our growth is further projected with opening new offices in another 3 prominent cities in India by the end of the year 2021.

• How have the Firm graphs changed since the foundation?

The firm started its journey with a small team in Ahmedabad and now has a PAN-India network of associations. We now have our offices operational in Mumbai, Kolkata, Bengaluru, and New Delhi. We have also marked our presence internationally through our associations across Asia.

• What is the reason behind your firm’s long-standing success?

Our law firm focuses on the following : i) proactive research-based advisory, ii) non-litigation & iii) highly research-based litigation.

We work with a fresh mind and hence prefer not to sit in the office after 7.30 PM on any working day.

We deploy the best legal strategy so that the ultimate aim is achieved.

We provide advisory & practice in every Indian law, with specialization. We deploy the blend of legal intelligence, researchdriven hours, strategy and intelligence to resolve and deal with every legal issue so that the ultimate aim is achieved. We strongly believe that quality, research, time, simplicity and ethical standards have no substitute when it comes to legal issues.

• What are the services the firm focuses on? How are your services different from those in the market?

Our Law Firm provides legal services in the following fields of law: 1. Goods and Services Tax 2. Arbitration (both domestic and international) 3. Insolvency and Bankruptcy Laws 4. Litigation (Civil and Criminal) 5. Contracts 6. Intellectual Property Laws

Ms Easha Manchanda Senior Associate AMLEGALS

7. Capital Markets 8. General Corporate and M&A 9. Direct Tax 10. White Collar Crimes 11. Advisory to e-commerce platforms 12. Competition and Anti-trust Laws 13. Energy. Infrastructure and Resources Law 14. Insurance and Reinsurance Laws 15. TMT Laws 16. Defense and Aerospace Laws 17. We provide specialized legal advisory in all of these fields apart from all other Indian Laws.

We strongly believe that “strategy in law matters the most”. In law, building up a case is more important than simply fighting a case and which requires correct strategy, commitment, experience, expertise, capability, and an expert team to execute the same.

• How do you decide to take the firm a step further in terms of your services?

Our firm strongly focuses on knowledge sharing and we actively work toward spreading knowledge

within the legal fraternity, the law student fraternity and to all our clients as well. Our team firmly focuses on research-driven strategies and all our advisory and services are backed by strong and reliable data derived from constant research.

We believe that there is no shortcut or substitute to hard-work and our constant efforts and focused attitude are what will push us forward among the leading legal service providers.

• Is there any new addition to the list of services? Anything exciting you would like to share?

We always look for new laws as an opportunity and challenge to work on. We are front liners in GST, IBC and recent in the list in data privacy laws.

Our motto is an attempt with challenges and put your heart and soul in every work to make it

exceptional.

• How have you seen diversity change over the years in the legal sector?

Over the years, gender equality and diversity have been applauded in the legal sector. Say, 20 years from now there weren’t as many female advocates in the legal industry.

Even if they were, there weren’t many holding prominent, influential positions. However, we see that a lot of women have come forward in the past couple of years and have established themselves in top leadership positions across our industry. Men and women have together raised the bar in the legal fraternity by putting in constant efforts and hard work. The misconception that being an advocate is a man’s job is long gone and the current scenario has seen more and more women advocates coming across as leaders and having successful careers over the years.

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 61

Interview with The Enterprise World

• Can you please brief us about your professional experience?

I have been associated with AMLEGALS from the inception of my career in 2018. My fields of interest include domestic and international Arbitration, Bankruptcy Laws and Commercial Laws. I have been a part of several international and domestic arbitrations and have represented our firm across several Courts, Tribunals and Judicial forums all over the country.

• What are the key achievements of your journey in the law and litigation sector?

It is my personal belief that in the legal profession, it is not a certain particular matter that can be considered as an achievement.

Instead, the entire journey, in its bits and pieces is in itself composed of the several tiny achievements that make us the Legal Professional that we are. In litigation, there is something new to learn from every single matter on each and every day. There is a new question that poses itself to every new point of law that we research. As legal professionals we cannot pride ourselves with triumphs in a certain matter; instead, we pride ourselves with the diversity and extent of knowledge that we possess and continue to learn every day.

I consider this diverse and everincreasing knowledge as an 62 | June 2020

achievement in my journey of law and litigation this far.

• How do you look after your employees? What makes your team unique?

We work as a team in every manner. We have set our own deadlines for work. We have various policies for our team which is not even deployed by tier I law firms in India.

• Is there any special experience with your clients you would like to highlight?

We work as an extended legal team for them. We educate and maintain transparency so that the client doesn’t have to ask us rather they know what our next move shall be before every action along with the underlying pros and cons.

• According to you what nextgeneration women advocates and litigators should focus on?

I believe that as women we often have to compete with a lot many things such as societal norms, gender-biased stigmas and we often have to limit ourselves genderspecific roles in our careers. As advocates, I believe women have the ability to change this and bring the change. For that, we need to be the change we want to see and break out of the shackles of ‘what law and society have always been like’ and change that into ‘what we

want our law and society to be like.’ So for the next generation of women advocates and litigators, I’d just like to shed some light on something Toni Morrison once said- “If there is a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, you must be the one to write it.”

• One person, who you admire the most?

Mrs. Indra Nooyi. She served as the CEO of PepsiCo from 2006 to 2018, and over that time, the company’s revenue rose by 80%.

She has been extremely outspoken about the struggles of maintaining the work-home balance as a leader of one of the world’s largest companies and has come proven herself to be a symbol of success for women everywhere.

• Whose business story do you find the most inspiring?

I find the business story of Mrs. Rashima Misra the most inspiring.

She heads the role of Brand Development devising and implementing brand architecture framework in Milk Mantra, an Indian dairy Company based out of Orissa which was founded in 2009 and is one of the best examples of what a successful business venture looks like when it goes hand-inhand with the empowerment of farmers of East India.

www.marriott.com

ENBRACE UNCOMPLICATED LUXURY AT OUR 5-STAR HOTEL IN MUMBAI

Interview with The Enterprise World

A LAWYER YOU CAN ALWAYS TRUST ON!

N

aik Naik & Compa ny is a fullservice law firm established in the year 2004.

The firm’s core area of practice includes banking and finance, corporate and commercial advisory, intellectual property, litigation & arbitration, mergers & acquisitions, and private equity.

In a candid talk with Ms. Madhu Gadodia, Partner at the firm, let’s discover more about the firm and her journey towards the prominence.

• Tell us about the firm.

Naik Naik & Company has an unparalleled service in dispute resolution across all practices of corporate & commercial, intellectual property, private equity, restructuring & insolvency, technology, media, telecommunications, and white-collar crimes. The company has several high-profile clients in leading industries of the country.

FCAT. Given our deep-rooted relationships with most senior counsels, we are fortunate to be guided by them from time to time.

Our International Arbitration expertise in key industry sectors such as oil & gas, real estate, infrastructure, and retail has enabled us to establish a robust presence in International Commercial Arbitrations in Singapore and London. In the banking and finance sector (including the NBFCs), we have been able to provide innovative and plausible solutions to our clients, to mitigate procedural bottlenecks.

Our corporate team is well versed with crossborder and global aspects of the corporate practice. We handle inbound and outbound corporate clients who have involved us in their expansion story. Over the years, they have generated exceptional revenue for the corporate practice of the firm. Similarly, the Private Equity and mergers and Acquisition sectors are growing.

The firm is known to be a preferred choice for Corporate and Commercial disputes given its vast experience in dealing with practical aspects of Corporate & Commercial Laws, especially with respect to FDI and SEBI norms.

• What were the initial challenges you faced?

The firm’s Dispute Resolution practice has peaked in the past few years. Within Dispute Resolution, we cover all practices ranging from white-collar crimes, frauds and scams-related litigations, disputes related to intellectual property, constitutional challenges, private equity, corporate commercial, bankruptcy, mergers, and amalgamations, amongst others.

The firm’s practice has been very active in Delhi mainly due to the location of forums mainly Supreme Court, NCLAT, CCI, TDSAT, APTEL, 64 | June 2020

We started our journey as one of the first few firms with a comprehensive media practice.

While there was a first-mover advantage, we also faced issues as there were no ready templates and the sector was still evolving. One factor that has always worked in our favour, is the tremendous amount of hard work we put in legal research and familiarizing ourselves with sector-specific nuances. It was challenging to make a mark in a sector that was evolving, but

all of us conjoined our synergies to make sure that we walk steadily on this unconventional path.

Another challenge we faced was to be typecast as a boutique media firm. The expanse of work we did in the media sector catapulted us as the top-notch firm doing all high-end and high-stake matters in the media space. But our capabilities were much larger. The phenomenal work is done by us in all the other practice areas including litigation, corporate advisory, banking & finance, real estate, etc. Therefore, building a full-service law firm was not just a natural progression, but also a well-thought-out vision. The firm now swears by the amalgamation of industry focus and service lines.

Our practice areas have substantially expanded to corporate transactions and dispute resolution in the areas of real estate, retail, oil and gas, hospitality, e-commerce to name a few.

• Which was that point that triggered the growth of the Firm?

The technology and emerging media led the growth of companies provided us with an opportunity to widen our scope of services in Technology, Media and Telecommunication. The increased use of tech by businesses and individuals profited us with booming growth. We simultaneously grew our number of clients and also widened the knowledge and skills of our professionals vastly.

We swiftly evolved with the trends and today are extremely specialized in emerging areas like creation of digital platforms, e-commerce, content acquisition, distribution,

exhibition, and IP advisory, advising some of the largest digital media players and leading international studios. Today, we cover the entire spectrum of services ranging from litigation to non-litigation, digital media, technology, and convergence. Our growth in the TMT sector provided us an opportunity to expand to several other practice areas such as Corporate and Real-estate.

• What is the reason behind your firm’s long-standing success?

We believe the long-standing success of our firm is positively related to the efficiency of our human resources. We believe in strengthening our partnership by adding partners to create a more robust platform. We believe in encouraging and nurturing talent and equipping them with the necessary skill-sets to build their individual identity. We take pride in our pedigree, which has nurtured some of the finest lawyers and counsels of today’s generation. The varied nature of matters handled by the firm enables them to gain practical exposure required in resolving complex legal issues.

• What are the services the firm focuses on? How are your services different from those in the market?

We are a full-service firm that specializes in banking & finance, corporate & commercial advisory, intellectual property, litigation & arbitration, mergers & acquisitions, and private equity. We have been well recognized for our Media & Entertainment (M&E) practice and have excelled in Dispute Resolution across all sectors, mainly all litigations related to

Corporate, Private Equity and Frauds. We deeply understand sector-related technicalities and execute risk mitigation strategies prior to litigation.

We have also diversified and served clients in the International Arbitration space and handled Shareholder disputes in the Oil and Gas sectors. Our success rate is close to 100 %, we have been a part of most of the significant matters reported in the last three years. In the space of International Commercial Arbitration, we handle a minimum of 3 arbitrations out of Singapore.

The differentiating point for Naik Naik & Company is our diversified knowledge in each industry sector and we believe the level of substance and gravitas in our advice is what sets us apart from our competition. Our Managing Partner, Mr. Ameet B. Naik, is very hands-on with all the mandates and matters; and all the Partners have been groomed also in the same way. Therefore, every mandate gets sufficient Partner time and there are several layers of ‘Quality Check’ through which a piece of advice flows, before reaching the client.

We take pride in our quick turnaround time and the comfort with which a client can fall back upon us.

• Is there any new addition to the list of services? Anything exciting you would like to share? a) We envision Naik Naik & Company to become a leader in the Litigation, International Arbitration, Corporate and Digital &Technology space within the next three years.

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 65

Interview with The Enterprise World b) Given our international affiliations and our international footprint in terms of cross-border work and international disputes, we are gearing up to expand our client base internationally.

• What are the key achievements of your journey in the law and media sector?

I have been a known name in the Media & Entertainment sector, having represented some of the biggest individuals and brands. The fraternity reckons me as an expert in the field of Intellectual Property and her practice covers not only copyright but also all areas covered under IP including trademarks and patents. I have extensive experience handling multiple portfolios of work scattered across various fields including gaming and all facets of established and emerging new media.

I also handle Banking & Finance matters at the Firm and have been representing some of the biggest Financial Institutions and Non-Banking Financial Companies (NBFCs). I have had the privilege of handling some of the largest claims in Debt Recovery matters and fortunately, have been able to handle a lot of work under the Indian Bankruptcy Code (IBC).

I have advised over 500 film production and distribution deals; and have rendered legal assistance in the acquisition of film libraries and format rights, service agreements, licensing agreements and technology related to intellectual property as well as E-Commerce. I have been instrumental in structuring complicated financing-cumdistribution deals, production and 66 | June 2020

co-production deals for Bollywood production houses and Hollywood studios. Besides the Supreme Court of India and High Courts across various states, key forums where I have been appearing include National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT), Film Certification Appellate Tribunal (FCAT) and Debt Recovery Tribunal (DRT). I have also had the experience of representing the Indian Broadcasting Federation, as well as the associations of television and film producers including IFTPC and IMPAA. It was a privilege for me to represent a leading broadcaster before TDSAT in its dispute with the distributor and Indian Broadcasting Federation in its challenge to certain provisions of the Copyright Act, 1957 and amendments thereto.

Some of the noteworthy clients represented by meinclude the likes of Amitabh Bachchan, Deepika Padukone, Anil Kapoor, Sonam Kapoor, Ramesh Sippy, Manmohan Shetty, Shashi Ranjan, Viacom 18, T-Series, Tips Industries, Saavn, Phantom, Endemol, Creative Eye Ltd., Pen Films Ltd., Friday Film Works, Kwan, Bling, CA Media, Capital First and Reliance Broadcasting.

• How do you look after your employees?

We invest a considerable amount of time to nurture our pool of talent and maintain positive energies within our team. The senior members of our firm take personal responsibility to mentor and groom the team members to become trusted advisors of the clients. We work by a principle where success – at – work and happiness – at – home are mutually inclusive. We

encourage creativity and our ideals for our team rest on the three sines qua nonpillars of Teamwork, Trust and Appreciation.

• Is there any special experience with your clients you would like to highlight?

We have assisted two of the top ten conglomerates of the country in acquiring top existing players in the Digital Platform, Gaming Platform and Talent Acquisition Platform.

All the deals that we have orchestrated have been successful in protecting the clients’ interests owing to our understanding of the demand, supply, and other economic factors.

• One person, who you admire the most?

In the legal fraternity, it would be Mr. Ameet Naik. Founder of Naik Naik & Co. and our Managing Partner, Mr. Ameet Naik, is a visionary in truest sense of the word. He is a knowledge powerhouse for any individual and his zeal, foresight, go-getter attitude and aggression towards leading the firm is unparalleled. His enthusiasm and commitment have lead to the firm’s immense growth and he has carved out a niche in the sector. I truly believe in one of the quotes he frequently orates -

WORK COMES TO THE WORKER.

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The 20 Prominent Women Lawyers to Watch in 2020

Ms. Komal Solomon ·One has to be mindful of choosing the direction where you are headed and once you are headed in that direction, trust yourself. Work towards creating a happier world and things automatically start to fall in place.”

– Ms. Komal Solomon

68 | June 2020

Ms. Komal Solomon Partner Solomon & Co.

S

olomon & Co. was founded in 1909 and is amongst India's oldest law firms. The Firm has 3 offices, 2 in Mumbai and 1 in Pune. The Firm provides legal services across the Republic of India. Solomon & Co. is a fullservice firm and is qualified and competent to provide legal service on all areas of Indian law.

The Firm advises Indian and international companies and high net-worth individuals on all aspects of Indian law. The Firm's broad range of practice enables them to provide comprehensive solutions for each specific client matter, based upon a thorough understanding of all relevant legal issues.

Ms. Komal Solomon has been in the legal practice for about 25 years and has been with the Firm since 2006. She graduated from Jai Hind College and thereafter read law at the Government Law College in

Mumbai. She is a Senior Partner for the Media and Entertainment and Intellectual Property Law Practice. Komal has advised leading production houses, television channels, signers/ writers/artists on various media and entertainment law assignments including filing, prosecution, registration of a trademark, copyright, and related intellectual property rights.

A Journey to Prominence One of the key challenges they faced was the transformation of a traditional real estate and litigation law firm into a full-service law firm.

There have been several factors amongst which focused approaches; a dedicated team has been the key element that contributed to the growth of the firm. The growth story has been gradual yet consistent; they started

off with one associate, one office, and now have a staff of over 85 people spread across 3 offices in two major cities, Mumbai and Pune.

Solomon & Co. celebrates completion of 111 years. The blend of traditional knowledge and expertise melded with modernized technology and cost-competitive billing structures have been vital factors of the firm long-standing success.

Their quality offerings Solomon & Co. is a full-service law firm, offering services in a broad range of practice areas including Corporate, Mergers and Acquisitions, Business and Trade, Banking and Finance, Capital Markets, India entry, Private Equity, Dispute Resolution, Real Estate and Construction, Insurance and Intellectual Property. Firm's presence across Mumbai and in

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 69

The 20 Prominent Women Lawyers to Watch in 2020 Pune at strategic locations as well as their network and partnership with lawyers in over 40 cities within the country and across the globe enables the team to provide solution-oriented advice within a short timeframe thus making them different.

treat all staff equally irrespective of their positions within the Firm.

Firms' uniqueness lies in the fact that they have a team of energetic, well qualified, young, and dynamic lawyers open to face challenges and handle complicated matters across a spectrum of practice areas where teams seamlessly coordinate with each other internally and provide comprehensive solutions to clients.

The firm taking a step further with The firm aims to grow beyond 100 professionals within the next year.

The firm's focus would be to continue developing the legal practice within the Mumbai and Pune regions while exploring growth to other one or two cities whilst keeping the standards and quality of legal advice always on top priority.

Diversity change over the years in the legal sector The legal fraternity across India has seen an emergence from a malecentric space to one with rising gender neutrality and increasing inclusiveness in the intake of female employees. The industry is sensitizing towards gender parity and is becoming more inclusive.

The Workforce People at Solomon & Co. think of themselves as one big family. They

Ms. Komal Solomon - A lawyer with the evolutionary vision Ms. Komal Solomon is a partner at Solomon & Co. and has been in practice for 25 years'. Komal graduated from Jai Hind College and thereafter read law at the Government Law College in Mumbai. She specializes in matters relating to corporate and regulatory compliance, regulatory communications, immigration laws, entertainment, and media law, India entry strategies, and intellectual property law.

She has assisted several multinationals in establishing their subsidiaries, branch offices, and liaison offices in India.

endlessly in courts. Having a diversified practice helps identify risk and addresses issues holistically by structuring and offering solutions to prevent disputes at the inception of the discussion rather than on the occurrence of a default or delay or dispute.“ According to her, Mr. Bijesh Thakkar and Mr. Navin Parekh have been a true source of motivation for her since long.

Unconventional business stories have intrigued her; Ace Seafood Bazaar Private Limited and Kommune Arts Private Limited are some of the businesses that have struck as profoundly interesting to her.

“Staying true to yourself, keeping your values and traditions intact, helps you to stand out from the crowd. My seniors always said, which I strongly believe in – “Ensure you shine in whatever you do. That will only happen when you put in your 100%”.

Ms. Komal added.

Ms. Komal says, “Businesses are expanding in multiple directions, clients prefer out of court settlements rather than litigate

Honesty and loyalty towards yourself and in the work you do is a key to success.

70 | June 2020

D

epression… reading this word, different types of thoughts come to everyone’s mind. Some say that there is no such thing as depression, all is an illusion of the mind, and some say that depression is a serious problem and it is very important to get it treated in time. If it is not treated, a person can cause great harm to himself or someone else.

Since few days a debate is intensified that is depression really a very serious disease or is it only a delusion of the mind that makes a person negative.

What we call depression today began in Mesopotamia in the second millennium BCE. During this period, depression was discussed in a spiritual form instead of a physical condition. Like other mental illnesses, the disease was considered demonic possession, so it was treated by priests and messiahs of different faiths rather than doctors. Even in ancient times, when depression was defined simply as a monstrous shadow, there were some doctors who believed that depression is a biological and psychological disease. Greek and Roman doctors at that time used to treat patients in many ways, including gymnastics, massage, food, music, bathing, donkey milk.

At the same time, the credit for finding the physical causes of depression goes to a Greek doctor named Hippocrates. This doctor said that depression occurs due to four types of imbalances in the body. This imbalance was called Humer. During this time, it was especially believed that due to the excess of black bile, sadness comes and this sadness was treated through bathing, washing, exercise, and eating.

The Romans believed that depression and other mental illnesses were caused only by the wrath of demons and gods. At the same time, Cicero, a Roman philosopher, and leader believed that sadness had psychological reasons like anger, fear, and mourning. In the 18th and 19th century depression is defined as a weakness in nature, which cannot be changed. It was said by this belief that people of this nature should be turned away from society or they should be stopped somewhere. At the same time, doctors began to believe that at the same time, the basis of this state of mind is anger.

Earlier people did not believe that depression is a disease; they believed it to be the result of the wrath of demons and gods. But in 1970, the term Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) was used for the first time in the US. This situation became part of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual-3 at the official level in 1980. Today, doctors believe that depression occurs due to many reasons, which have biological, psychological, and social factors. Depression is divided into three categories, Mild, Moderate, and Severe. Talking about today’s era, a person is mainly depressed due to money, problems in relations, and not achieving his goal. Apart from this, there can be many reasons such as education, family mobilization, failure on the expectations of parents, hormonal changes, increasing loans, losses.

One also has to take a pledge that he or she will stay after defeating depression and he/she will do whatever has to do to defeat it. Because it is a mental disease, one can also defeat it through the resolve. For this one can adopt some methods like- Take at least 8 hours of sleep, sit in the sun for a while, exercise, and also give yoga and meditation a place in your life. Meditation makes the mind very calm and also reduces the confusion of the mind. Apart from this, talk to friends, tell them about your heart, involve people in your life, and do as much physical activity as possible.

72 | June 2020

Is depression a very serious disease or is it just a delusion of the mind?

www.theenterpriseworld.com | 73

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