In Mahindra (2019), the Delhi High Court established that a strict, water-tight separation of powers does not apply under the Indian Constitution, allowing specialised regulatory bodies like the CCI to blend administrative and quasi-judicial functions. It confirmed that the CCI must adhere to checks and balances, such as mandatory judicial members during hearings and appellate review. So why are we beating around the bush on Axon? Stick to our own constitutional jurisprudence.

I am new to all this – but when reading, I can see Indian courts sticking to the decision of the circuit court in Axon when it comes to it.

https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/us-9th-circuit/2108762.html

To clarify, Axon served as the procedural gateway that enabled the conservative majority to later deploy theories like the unitary executive theory in cases like Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo (attacked delegated legislation), SEC v. Jarkesy (SEC had ALJs - ruled illegal), and West Virginia v. EPA (reduced scope of federal regulators). Axon was unianimous actually. Justice Elena Kagan, a stalwart defender of the administrative state, actually wrote the 9-0 majority opinion with Thomas concurring. The Axon decision was unanimous because it focused entirely on a procedural loophole, not the actual merits of the constitutional issue.

Axon had three issues:

(1) The clearance process used to determine whether the FTC or DOJ will review a merger violates due process,

(2) The fact that the FTC combines investigatory, prosecutorial, adjudicative, and appellate functions within a single agency violates due process, and

(3) The dual-layer of protection given to FTC ALJs violates the Appointments Clause of Article II of the Constitution.

So there is a lot of mish-mash in the preceding discussion here. Point 2 is different from Point 3. Connected in some way, meh, debatable. Quoting the judgement: "The Commission knows a good deal about competition policy, but nothing special about the separation of powers. For that reason, “agency adjudications are generally ill-suited to address structural constitutional challenges” - like those maintained here." So all Axon says is that agencies lack the specific expertise to decide structural constitutional questions like the separation of powers.

Coming to India, Axon definitely influenced litigation in India, but some of Axon's questions have been posed even before Axon in India though Axon itself rising from the merger control side. In India, most of the cases are on the enforcement side.

(1) Meta (Facebook) & WhatsApp - Meta argued that because the privacy policy was already scrutinized by the Supreme Court and High Courts under data privacy laws, the CCI had no business launching a simultaneous suo motu antitrust probe. Predates Axon in the SCOTUS.

(2) Global Fragrance & Ingredient Manufacturers - IFF moved the Delhi High Court to halt the probe, asserting that procedural overreach by the Director General (DG) and the CCI violated basic tenets of natural justice. Post-Axon in the SCOTUS. The only one here.

(3) JioStar (Formerly Star India) - JioStar bypassed the agency's primary process and appealed directly to the High Courts using Bharti Airtel Judgment on sectoral regulator precedence. Predates Axon in the SCOTUS.

(4) Auto Parts Case - Effectively expanded a single consumer complaint into a sweeping suo motu-style industry-wide probe, penalising 14 car manufacturers. Predates Axon in the SCOTUS.

(5) Amazon and Flipkart Sellers - An alliance of associated sellers filed 24 separate writ petitions across multiple state High Courts stalling any progress in the cases. Half of it predates Axon in the SCOTUS. Another batch is after Axon.

So it's not like something new was dramatically found when Axon came out in SCOTUS. It's just that parties decided to target the weakness in the regulatory state more head-on using writ jurisdiction. The CCI had long lived with it. European law allowed for it. American ideas of separation of powers did not. Now India has become a test case. The CCI hit by writs across the board has suffered.

You may want to have a look at this old article by Srivatsa Krishna, IAS:

timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/sunday-toi/all-that-matters/Four-vital-steps-to-fight-corruption/articleshow/8908705.cms

Going to jump in - the FTC's internal adjudication feels like a "kangaroo court" (as argued in Para 31 of the Axon complaint) is precisely because the agency lacks political accountability. Proponents of the Unitary Executive argue that structural unfairness happens because these "independent" agencies answer to "no one". If the President had the power to oversee, the structural bias could be checked by a politically accountable branch. Therefore, the "fairness" argument and the "unitary" argument are two sides of the same coin.

Justice Thomas explicitly questioned the constitutionality of the FTC’s entire structure on Article II grounds. He noted that combining prosecutorial and adjudicative powers in an agency that is insulated from presidential control raises severe constitutional problems. By doing this, Thomas showed that you cannot separate the "fairness" of the ALJ setting from the "unitary theory" of executive oversight.
The primary claim in Axon was that FTC ALJs are insulated with "for-cause" removal protections, the Kangaroo court aspect was add-on.

Interesting read, given the context here

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/silent-exit-why-good-employees-leave-before-resign-pradeep-hatgaonkar-6vcdc?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_ios&utm_campaign=share_via

This is the BS that comes from within, and classic case of structural weakness worth attacking before any individual point. The four arguments contradict each other. Point 1 says the brand carries the work (people don’t matter). Point 4 says the departing people didn’t bill much (people matter, and these ones underperformed). Point 2 says people leave freely (people matter enough to need explaining). Three incompatible theories of why the exits are irrelevant. Someone confident in any one of them wouldn’t need the other two !!!

1. “Biggest by miles / clients want the seal of approval” -Scale is a lagging indicator, it measures brand equity built over decades not current bench strength. What the claim actually concedes, if clients buy CAM for regulatory cover rather than better advice, that’s an argument about risk-shifting, not quality. Brand cover is exactly the thing that erodes when the named partners who anchored client trust leave. The “cleaning up after tier 1 firms” line is unfalsifiable anecdote, every firm says it about every other firm.

2. “Never forces people to stay” -This answers a question nobody asked. The issue isn’t whether exit is permitted, it’s why so many are choosing it. Framed properly, it’s an admission, if departures are genuinely unconstrained, then attrition is pure revealed preference. The cleanest possible signal that something is wrong. Worth separating “free to leave” from “free to leave without friction” ...... notice periods, garden leave, non-solicits, withheld settlements blah blah, the list can be endless... etc etc are all testable, and the answer is rarely as clean as the slogan.

3. “No further partners are leaving. Stop spreading lies.” - An unverifiable negative about the future, asserted with certainty by someone who structurally cannot know it, resignations are confidential until they aren’t. It’s also the claim most likely to be falsified within a quarter, which makes it a credibility hostage. Since last year end, it was all fine, then it all started falling like a pack of cards. The shift to name calling where evidence should be is itself the tell.

4. “They weren’t billing much anyway” - The market disagrees, competitors (AZB, SAM, KCO, Trilegal, S&R, Anagram etc) hired them, presumably not at a discount. Billing credit is also allocated by origination systems the firm controls, so it’s a circular metric. And “enough competent partners to pick up the slack” concedes there is slack. Strategically, this is the weakest point to make publicly, disparaging departed colleagues is precisely the behaviour that makes the people still inside start taking recruiter calls .......

The strongest overall move, everything here is unverifiable assertion (private financials, anonymous poster), so don’t fight on facts you can’t source. Fight on internal coherence and on the one thing the post itself concedes, that people who are free to leave ARE LEAVING !

Thank you all for your attention to this matter. Happy Founder's Day too !

A few of us thought a quick game of catch on DHC's lawn couldn't possibly go wrong. Bold assumption, in hindsight.

The first throw drifted a little high and landed, with what can only be described as remarkable precision, directly on a Senior Advocate. Miraculously, he wasn't hurt and, ever the good sport, picked up the ball and lobbed it back. His return throw, powered by decades of seniority and noticeably fewer decades of hand-eye coordination, veered off and landed on... another Senior Advocate. Small lawn. Suspiciously large odds.

This one was not amused. Visibly wounded by the sheer audacity of junior advocates enjoying themselves on DHC's grass, he snatched up the ball and launched it in fury, in principle, who's to say at one of my friends, who ducked just in time. The ball carried on and found yet another advocate.

Senior. Obviously.

By now a small crowd had gathered, drawn by the commotion and, one assumes, by nothing better to bill for at that hour. As everyone demanded to know what on earth was going on, it emerged that almost the entire crowd shared the same designation. A gathering convened to complain about a ball game had, without anyone quite intending it, turned into something resembling a Full Court reference.

They're still deciding what to do about us. Personally, I think the real agenda item should be how anyone is expected to stand on that lawn without hitting a Senior Advocate.

Why no protest from NALSAR regarding this?

A video that has surfaced on the internet recently shows senior journalist Aman Chopra allegedly being harassed by Jharkhand Police amid his coverage around the ongoing student protests in Ranchi. In the viral video, Chopra, a senior journalist associated with the Network 18 group can be seen being approached by the cops while he was reportedly having breakfast. He calmly asks the cops why he is being questioned when they asked him to join them for questioning. He can also be seen confronting the cops in a room, trying to fetch a reason behind his alleged detention. Cops can be heard saying, "His acts have been disrupting their duty."

https://www.freepressjournal.in/india/jharkhand-student-protests-aap-iss-tarah-se-kyun-journo-aman-chopra-questioned-by-cops-while-having-breakfast-bjp-slams-soren-video

The difference between Kant and Gogoi (other than the latter being more apparently condemnable) is that Gogoi was never invited to NALSAR. This CJI's words and actions have been condemnable, and have come during his time in the office. And BJP government ministers and CMs have not been as big a problem, because they do not hold a judicial position that the students are most proximately affected by.

NALSAR is an institution in itself and in the country, and a comparison with American unis is a false equivalence. Politicians in Telangana invoke its name in their campaigns, and it will have a constant stream of legal and judicial experts without fail. Speaking out against the institution, at the university level as well as the national level, is their right, and also the very essence of NALSAR. And also a veiled message against NALSAR leadership that wants to use the convocation to further its own political agenda. If you have a problem with people speaking their minds freely and publicly, go to Pakistan (lol).

https://inews.co.uk/news/education/17-top-universities-set-accept-students-lower-grades-4685409?srsltid=AfmBOopSy2R0ShJv3t90tf0Ks8q9Xzx9qXX4C_JKi5BW8UhV0ArIXhMw

https://www.thetimes.com/uk/education/article/universities-student-lower-grades-foreign-8fqmbs9q7

Top UK universities in UK have lowered their entry standards. Those who go to UK are the ones not good enough for India, and employers know this. The same applies to Canada, Australia, and Germany.

Not to give too much away but his defence during the open house the following day was quite funny. Looked at hickeys and thought they were signs of "domestic violence".

Think the slap is more recent and from his time at CNLU, where I imagine he functions independent of higher forces.

First JLS for AI last year with 15CR grant, now IIMA for GCs this year for how much? Does anyone know but won’t pay his lawyers ! Thoughts?

https://www.barandbench.com/news/corporate/cyril-shroff-and-iim-ahmedabad-co-found-cyril-shroff-iima-gc-leadership-academy

Professors at a premier NLU have mentioned to students that a faculty colleague of theirs [name redacted] has received full-funding to pursue their doctoral studies at UCL. The faculty themselves are a batch-rank holder of another rising premier NLU and obtained a first-class LLM from world's leading university in UK. It is absolutely amazing to see what young leadership at the helm of old NLUs can create. Someday, majority of NLU grads teaching in India could be holders of foreign LLMs or PhDs!

2023 grad here, is it possible to go from litigation (delhi) to NDA? I recently read about their "academy" and it looks pretty interesting, like for upskilling / future-proofing (whatever that means lately). I have worked on my fair share of commercial and tech matters; is it possible to make the switch ? If yes, then how? help a sister out please.

I wanna know what are some good chambers in Delhi for a wide range of work, but mostly white collar crime/ IBC work etc. Small offices would do, but shall be paying at least 40k to freshers and also some place which might have reasonable leaving time coz being a girl it's practically hard to stay back until 11pm or later in Delhi.

It’s also reported by The Bar Bulletin https://thebarbulletin.com/elp-partners-restructuring-tax-trade-practice-separation/

Hi,

As an M&A lawyer from tier-1, how difficult or easy is it to switch to Disputes practice of a law firm. Also i have heard partners like manmeet singh have worker in PF practice area for years and now are great disputes lawyer. Also is the experience of M&A discounted and do we need to join as fresher or A0