Khaitan & Co has increased the base remuneration paid to freshers from Rs 13.2 lakh per year (as revised in 2014) to Rs 14.4 lakh per year plus an annual bonus of up to Rs 1.8 lakh.
Correction: The earlier published version of this story stated that Khaitan had changed to a guaranteed bonus structure for freshers. It appears that this information had been miscommunicated to us and is incorrect. We will be publishing more details shortly. We regret for the error.
The salary change will now apply to all first years working at the firm, confirmed a Khaitan partner, with the bonuses equivalent to 150 per cent of monthly retainer to be paid out each April.
The partner and a law student with knowledge of the hike confirmed, that the firm had increased the monthly base pay from Rs 1.05 lakh to Rs 1.2 lakh.
Until now the firm paid Rs 13.2 lakh per year, which could increase to up to Rs 15.2 lakh with a discretionary bonus.
The change was made after realising that in previous years, in the majority of cases, the firm was paying a 150 per cent bonus anyway, said a partner.
On top of that, the partner told Legally India, it reflected the “overall strategy of the firm” to attract quality talent, and “we thought that this is a fair compensation package”.
It is understood from conversations with law students that a number of firms have also increased the packages.
Comments
Would be great if you could post the updated fresher salary structure at AZB Mumbai? Thanks.
So, this I guess, is limited to Corp segment only. We are getting only 10.4+bonus
Litigation team is always discriminated against when it comes to salary.
Kian, confirm this soon, please!
Or, are such articles representative of KCO, Mumbai (Corporate) only?!
They have worked hard for 5 years so please give them some reward
Shame!!
Also, do law firms include benefits like health insurance, relocation allowance, etc. within this pay bracket?
Also, what is the rate of tax that associates in law firms need to pay? Is it 10% (PGBP) or 30% like any other salaried person earning above 10 lakhs?
10% TDS is deducted.
2nd year 8,40,000 + bonus
3rd year 12,00,000 + bonus
after that performance based
Are associates employed as employees (in which case what they get in hand is much less than this) or as consultants?
Also, no one should bother with amarchand. Their idea is that you are benefitting from working with them so much that the money shouldn't matter. I heard they refused to even reveal starting salary while recruiting!
All firms can say they are going to pay anything. The only real way to judge this is to look at their BASE salary and then understand the structure of their [u]discretionary[/u] bonus. Anything else is misleading.
They have not increased salary since 2008.
Increased clients/work too?
Are you an insider? That will give credibility to your comment. Or were you chucked out because of non-performance and thus the frustration.
At Luthra, however, they make you sign a 3-year bond. Never heard of it being enforced strictly though.
Can some insider explain why they choose to stick to Amarchand?
And then they suck your blood. Better go to AZB than a blood bank.
Haigrieve is a Marwari and surely knows what and why he's paying to young graduates. Undoubtedly, the Firm is making big, big money!
We have lost Rasgotra and the lit practice to SAMU.
Thank you
Keep laughing.
Firms don't bother revising once in 2-4 years altogether; and KCO is doing it in consecutive years!
Kudos!
I have been working at Khaitan at several years. I have seen transition from not having HR at all to having a head of HR (IIM-A grad) after we lost our previous HR head to SAM. I will not call our HR as the finest but definitely better than what I hear from other firms. Law firms are still away to have HR like corporates (may be lawyers don't want HR to be involved). Things have gradually improved after one new partner has been roped into HR. Moved to 5 days week, relatively on time feedbacks, etc, what more one can ask for?
Maybe Kian should interview them & ask how they feel! #NationWantsToKnow
Kian any inside information on this
Any reviews about the overall working conditions at Khaitan? Are they open to hiring out of work alumni of Top Tier law schools?
They must introduce some Returnship programme on the lines if Goldman Sachs. Better get some experienced hands for the buck than some useless freshers.
Kian, why don't you do a comparison of ratio of ranked partners in Chambers to the total partners in each top tier firm?
Kian and Prachi, I understand you guys have to rush and publish stories in order to remain ahead of B&B, but, once that's done, I think it would befit you to answer the genuine questions that follow. Genuine in the sense that, the questions which should've been dealt with in the main article itself but were not.
There are people who read such stories and then raise their expectations. Some parents of law students also tend to nurture expectations, accordingly.
Reading all the comments above, I'd list the following questions to you, which I really think is your responsibility to answer.
1. Why was there no official press release from KCO, like always? Why haven't you named the Partner who has confirmed this development? This is unlike previous KCO developments.
2. Is this pay scale applicable only to the batch of 2016, placed on Day Zero, as your article suggests or would this also be applicable to the batch of 2015 joining this July?
3. Is this applicable to the litigation team as well or are they paid lesser than the ones in the Corporate practice?
4. Is this the standard pay scale for all offices or just Mumbai or just Mumbai and Delhi. What is a student, who has gotten placed with, say, the Delhi office, supposed to assume?
5. Is this package only offered to those who've been recruited through on-campus placements or also to those who secured a PPO after an internship at the Firm?
6. Is this applicable to selected students from all Colleges or is there a differential between NLUs and other Colleges?
Hoping for and looking forward to some answers, Kian and Prachi!
Thanks.
1. Khaitan doesn't always do press releases about everything, and never have about salary hikes (they only press release partner hires, partner promotions, and deals, in my experience). In this case we went to a partner in charge of salaries / recruitment and confirmed, but there wasn't enough time, due to the long weekend, to get internal approval on quotes. We'll probably get some on the record confirmation soon though.
2. No, it's applicable to the current freshers at the firm, as set out in the story. The 2016 batch could see another hike by then, who knows.
3. I believe it's for all teams, but there's a fuller answer we'll get from the firm in a bit.
4. Yes, all offices are on the same pay scale for campus recruits (but there's a fuller answer, again).
5. PPO / campus are the same. Lateral hires might not always be...
6. I believe this goes for all colleges, but might exclude lateral hires.
Will update in a while with more details.
I understand that the 2014 freshers in corp were paid less than Mumbai with other teams getting paid even lesser. Please get the proper story. The fact that Bangalore is being paid the same as Mumbai is not true. Also not true on similar treatment and pay for all irrespectove of college or practice area.
@ kian: I was just wondering that whatever you have stated is based on some information or this is what you feel.
And second, amss never discloses salary when they interview candidates. I think this is how the recruitment process works for them. I am not sure but this is what someone told me..
Batch of 2014 has been drawing 1.10 L a month in both the offices.
Also, fix the 'show latest comments only' link, please.
Seeing LI's last year report, I took my package to be 15.2 L. Now, citing this report I tell my folks it's 16.2 L!
God damn it, now you say there's a difference between Mumbai and all other offices and also in practice areas.
Say clearly in your reports that this is only for so and so practice area and for only so and so office.
Irresponsible reporting at its best!
In a nutshell, it now turns out that the Rs 1.8 lakh bonus figure at Khaitan is not guaranteed, although a majority last year got the full bonus, apparently.
I sincerely regret the error, which appears to have been caused by a series of miscommunications and partners travelling and being unreachable over the long weekend.
Hope to explain more fully shortly once I have all the details.
Best regards,
Kian
That's 1.20 L a month as reported by you against some 86k a month as being claimed by insiders, here.
That's a hell lot of difference! I'm talking about Litigation Team at KCO, Delhi.
Though in my defence, the source on the fixed bonus part was as authoritative and unequivocal on this point as could be, so I'm still trying to figure out exactly how this could have happened.
In any case, we now have an on-the-record confirmation from Khaitan partner Rabindra Jhunjhunwala that the base is Rs 14.4 lakh plus Rs 1.8 lakh bonus. Last year more than half of freshers were paid the full bonus, he said, and they expect this "trend" to continue.
Am trying to get on the record confirmation on whether the lit team in Delhi or freshers in Bangalore also gets the same. Again, our source told us that there was no differential, though they wanted to fully check internally, and I'll await formal confirmation on this.
Best regards,
Kian
For my part, I will NOT join if it turns out that I'll be paid 86k a month as against 1.10 L a month which I've been assuming since last year and 1.20 L a month that I've been assuming since you reported this story, last week! Don't even talk about how I'll have to explain this to my folks.
I'm pretty sure that when they hire freshers laterally into litigation, not directly from campus, the salary might be different though.
Am happy to help and pick up the phone and explain to your parents personally if you like - do send me an email with your details if it should become an issue.
Am happy to help and pick up the phone and explain to your parents personally if you like - do send me an email with your details if it should become an issue.[/quote]
Kian, were you actually serious here or were you being sarcastic?
Heard that many firm are increasing the salary this time as they want to match market standards.
Kian: before you prepare the salary tally, please talk to them.
Doubt it has prejudiced anyone, other than giving a few senior partners at other law firms some heartburn!
Khaitan partner Rabindra Jhunjhunwala said: "No differential between salary offered to freshers at different offices or in different practice areas."
That should be good enough to satisfy your folks, I hope?
Again, I would assume that this would not apply to year zeros hired laterally from counsel practice or other firms, for instance...
I really appreciate all your responses and also the way you admitted your lapse. Please be surer next time.
Thanks a lot. :)
Now I wonder what do people get by posting absolutely false comments like the ones above about 10.4 L annual. Get a life!
@ kian: I will do that but I hope it's not vaugue stating that 'once the mediation is over, the firm will increase the salary'.
Plus I wrote a column on which is the best national law school, which should get tempers flaring somewhat ;)
Kian: it is highly unlikely that azb, amss, Luthra would have confirmed salary structure. I hope all the details that you will publish tomorrow on salary structure is based on some sort of confirmation from respective firms.
AZB Mumbai, for instance, did not want to confirm current levels, neither did Amarchand Delhi and Luthra.
There should still be enough interesting data for you though, I hope :)
AZB Mumbai, for instance, did not want to confirm current levels, neither did Amarchand Delhi and Luthra.
There should still be enough interesting data for you though, I hope :)[/quote]
@ kian: heard that azb Mumbai and AMSS Mumbai are revising salary effective may 2015
Please do try and get a ballpark on AZB Mumbai fresher remuneration. I'll be joining this year and I'd really like to have some idea. And somehow 1.3 or 1.45 a month plus 3-6 months' salary as bonus seems very unrealistic.
Thanks.
http://www.rollonfriday.com/InsideInfo/UKCityFirms/tabid/68/Default.aspx
Kian: Luthra has increased its salary about 6 months ago, TTA has revised the salary 9 months ago and I am not sure if AMSS (Mumbai) is even revising the salary that you have quoted in your article.
Luthra, god knows - they've mostly been ignoring us for some reason for the last six months so it's very hard to get info out of them.
I hear, on the grapevine, Luthra is offering a wide variance depending on which law school you're from. For NLS, Nalsar, NUJS, they're offering top range, for second-rung in pecking order it's lower, and then there's a third, and maybe fourth 'tier' of colleges also. Can anyone confirm?
AMSS Mumbai figures are from Vandana Shroff (as quoted in the article), so they should be accurate.
Though the NLU Delhi 2016 batch has mostly been promised a salary equivalent to their peers at NLS, NALSAR, NUJS, etc. Which is somewhere in the range of Rs. 12.5-14 lakhs, including bonus.
Click the 'sort comments chronologically' button and they'll magically re-arrange on the page.
If you want to go back to nested layout, you can click the 'refresh' button...
Hope this helps.
Can anyone confirm?