A raft of law firms have picked up mandates on the four latest initial public offer (IPO) proposals to be filed with the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), with Amarchand Mangaldas taking two issuer mandates, Luthra & Luthra acting for one company and Rajani Associates for the fourth.

AZB, DSK and Trilegal have done well in Asia Pacific private equity deal rankings despite heavily depressed values and volumes this year.

Desai & Diwanji and J Sagar Associates (JSA) have sealed Essar Steel’s Rs 650 crore ($135m) purchase of Shree Precoated Steels, with JSA facing the “challenging” task of acting as joint counsel to both seller and buyer.

Khaitan & Co scored the Mahindra Holidays & Resorts listing in Mumbai, which netted the Mahindra Group around Rs. 275 crore over the past month and to many investors signalled a temporary end to the initial public offering (IPO) drought.

Tata Steel has selected an identical roster of firms to advise on its latest fundraising in London, with Amarchand Mangaldas, Talwar Thakore Associates, Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton and Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy reprising their roles from the monster 2008 Corus acquisition-related rights issue.

Amarchand Mangaldas, Khaitan & Co and Jones Day have advised on India’s largest initial public offer (IPO) in 18 months for Adani Power’s issue, which has so far seen four-fold oversubscription and is hoped to raise between Rs 2,700 and 3,000 crore ($558m to $620m).

Amarchand Mangaldas and Platinum Partners in Mumbai are advising on the Rs 308 crore ($64m) acquisition of a 35 per cent stake in Life Insurance Corporation of India’s (LIC) asset management arm by Nomura, which marks Platinum’s first instruction for the Japanese bank.

Amarchand Mangaldas is moving on with its second Government divestment instruction, advising NHPC (National Hydroelectric Power Corporation) on raising around Rs 1,680 crore through an initial public offering (IPO).

Clifford Chance’s lateral Amarchand Mangaldas hire has reaped rewards, as Rahul Guptan brought the firm the third Indiabulls Group mandate this year, acting for its underwriting bank.

Luthra & Luthra and S&R Associates acted as Indian counsel in Indian mining company Sterlite Industries’ $1.5bn (Rs 7,200 crore) equity fundraising, with Latham & Watkins and Shearman & Sterling handling the international advice.

Kanga & Co Mumbai partner Dhaval Vussonji is leading the team for the original bidder Bharati Shipyard, which already owns a 19.5 per cent stake in Great Offshore.

Despite meagre pickings, Desai & Diwanji, Khaitan & Co, AZB & Partners and Amarchand Mangaldas have topped an M&A league table, together advising on 30 Indian deals worth a total of $9.4bn in the last six months.

Platinum Partners has joined the team of legal advisers on the MTN – Bharti Airtel merger talks alongside four other firms on what could be India’s largest cross-border deal to date with a value of around $23bn (Rs 110,000 crore).

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, Lex Counsel and Platinum Partners have advised on a $17.5m (Rs 85 crore) joint venture (JV) deal between the UK’s Pearson Group and Delhi-based education company Educomp Solutions.

Amarchand and US firm Shearman & Sterling jointly advised the Californian venture capital fund Norwest Venture Partners in buying Rs250 crore ($51m) in the National Stock Exchange of India (NSE) under new foreign investment rules.

J Sagar and Associates (JSA) and Luthra & Luthra have completed the Rs 1,750 crore ($368m) takeover of mining company Dempo Group by London-listed Vedanta Resources subsidiary Sesa Goa.

Amarchand, Ashurst and Luthra & Luthra have restarted their work on the exhumed Oil India initial public offering (IPO), which the government hopes will fill its coffers by up to Rs 2,400 crore ($500m).

Vaish Associates Mumbai office is hammering out a health insurance JV between its close client Religare Enterprises and global insurance company Swiss Re.

The Vaish team is being led by partner Bomi Daruwala, assisted by associates Amitjivan Joshi and Arti Narsana.

Swiss Re is understood to be represented by its global in-house team but is due to pick its domestic Indian legal representation soon.

AZB & Partners has bagged the biggest ever Indian cross-border merger mandate, advising Bharti Airtel on its revived $23bn bid to take over South African telecoms major MTN.

London international Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer will be advising long-standing client MTN but the company’s Indian counsel has not yet been chosen.

AZB Delhi partners Ajay Bahl (pictured) and Gautam Saha are understood to be leading the legal team for Bharti, having won the instruction off the back of previous work done by the firm for the company.