Khaitan & Co has announced a bumper crop of promotions, elevating 16 principal associates to salaried partner level, and 8 to counsel.
The promotions take effect with retrospective effect, from 1 April 2020, increasing
This, according to its press release and most metrics, makes it the “first Indian law firm to cross 150 partners”.
Half of the new partners are based in Mumbai, but unusually for a market that’s not been a main driver of growth for any big law firm, Kolkata saw four promotions to partner, followed by three in Delhi, and one in Bengaluru.
The largest department in terms of partner promotions was tax, with a total of five new partners (of whom four were in direct tax).
Corporate got four new partners, disputes three and two were promoted in real estate.
The new partners are:
- Abhiraj Gandhi, real estate, Mumbai
- Abhishek Dadoo, corporate, Mumbai
- Aditi Sharma, direct tax, Mumbai
- Aditya Ganju, dispute resolution, Delhi
- Ankur Sangal, IP, Delhi
- Ashish Mehta, direct tax, Mumbai
- Asim Choudhury, direct tax, Kolkata
- Manavendra Mishra, dispute resolution, Mumbai
- Rahul Dhanuka, indirect tax, Kolkata
- Ravitej Chilumuri, dispute resolution, Mumbai
- Rusha Mitra, corporate, Kolkata
- Sarthak Sarin, corporate, Delhi
- Shabnam Shaikh, direct tax, Mumbai
- Shantanu Gupta, corporate, Mumbai
- Subhro Chatterjee, real estate, Kolkata
- Swathy Ramanath, EIR, Bengaluru
8 counsel promotions
The counsel round was heaviest on the disputes practice, where three climbed the ladder.
Corporate saw two new counsel (or three, including technology, media and telecoms (TMT)), with one each in banking and capital markets.
The new counsel are:
- Abhinav Chandan, TMT, Delhi
- Ahana Sinha, banking & finance, Mumbai
- Chirayu Chandani, capital markets, Mumbai
- Jyoti Sinha, dispute resolution, Mumbai
- Malav Shah, corporate, Mumbai
- Pranav Sampat, dispute resolution, Mumbai
- Rohit Ambast, corporate, Delhi
- Snehal Kakrania, dispute resolution, Delhi
’Cautious approach’ to promotions: Promotees will have to ‘justify extraordinary faith’
Amar Sinhji executive director, human resources, said: “In spite of the unprecedented situation and the uncertainty of how the near future will pan out, the firm continues to recognise outstanding performance and high potential.
“While there are many other outstanding and deserving members, we have taken a cautious approach in our promotions this year. We are certain that every member, who has been promoted, will fully justify the extraordinary faith that we have reposed in them and help play their part in navigating our firm through uncharted waters.
That does seem to imply that the firm would have liked to have promoted more to partner but ultimately decided to reduce the size of the pool. This would be expected, considering equity partners had taken a 20% cut on their drawings and all fee-earners salaries have been frozen, since April.
“We firmly believe in growing our own wood and these promotions are a true reflection of that,” added Sinhji.
Senior partner Haigreve Khaitan added: “My heartiest congratulations to all these outstanding lawyers on reaching this milestone in their careers.
“Each and every one of them has showcased their dedication and commitment to the firm, our clients, and colleagues over the years and especially through these unprecedented times.
“I am certain that with their legal acumen, industry knowledge and commercial insights, they will support the firm in building a brighter future, meet our clients’ needs and exceed their expectations.”
27 new principal associates
The firm has also promoted 27 to principal associate level, where Mumbai and Delhi saw the lion’s share of promotions.
In this rung, Delhi (at 13 new principal associates) actually saw a greater number of promotions than Mumbai (at 10 new principal associates).
The practice area to see the greatest number was corporate and funds, with 11, followed by 8 in disputes, 3 in tax and 2 in capital markets.
Bengaluru PAs
- Nagashayana Srinivasaiah, Capital Markets
- Tamarra Sequeira, Dispute Resolution
Kolkata PAs
- Shourya Sengupta, Corporate.
- Niraj Baheti, Indirect Tax
Mumbai PAs
- Shreya Dua, Corporate
- Aman Yagnik, Corporate
- Shreya Mukherjee, Corporate
- Rahul Jain, Direct Tax
- Priyanka Desai, Dispute Resolution
- Abhijit Mukherjee, Energy Infrastructure & Resources
- Rohit G Jayaraman, Funds
- Pratyushprava Saha, Indirect Tax
- Dhiren Karania, Intellectual Property
- Sneha Joshi, Real Estate
Delhi PAs
- Devi Prasad Patel, Capital Markets.
- Aditya Singha, Corporate
- Charu Chitwan, Corporate
- Kevin Peter, Corporate
- Nimisha Trehan, Corporate
- Shrey Agarwal, Corporate
- Tarang Shashishekar, Corporate
- Aditya Vikram Singh, Dispute Resolution
- Satish Padhi, Dispute Resolution
- Shalini Sati Prasad, Dispute Resolution
- Trishala Trivedi, Dispute Resolution
- Vivek Mathur, Dispute Resolution
- Wamika Trehan, Dispute Resolution
45 senior associates
On the senior associate front, a massive 45 have seen a bump up from the associate rung.
Little surprise in corporate making up the largest share of promotions here with 17, followed by 9 in disputes, 5 in banking and finance, 3 in capital markets, 2 in real estate and 1 in competition (incidentally, the only promotion in the competition team across all levels).
Bengaluru SAs
- Suman Prabhu, Capital Markets
- Chirag Narasimiah, Corporate
- Ishita Agarwal, Corporate.
- Kamna Kumar, Corporate
- Neil Madhav Deshpande, Corporate
- Srishti Ramkrishnan, Corporate
- Sukhmani Singh, Corporate
- Anisha Ashok Aatresh, Dispute Resolution
- Amruthavarshini, Real Estate
Kolkata
- Arindam Bhattacharjee, Banking & Finance
- Riya Dutta, Corporate
- Srinjoy Bhattacharya, Dispute Resolution
- Tridib Bose, Dispute Resolution
Mumbai
- Nandini Paliwal, Banking & Finance
- Riya Agicha, Banking & Finance
- Savni Tewari, Banking & Finance
- Surbhi Narang, Banking & Finance
- Aparna Bagree, Capital Markets
- Vijayaraghavan, Capital Markets.
- Anvita Mishra, Corporate
- Aman Dwivedi, Corporate
- Puneet Rathsharma, Corporate.
- Saumya Kakar, Corporate
- Soumil Garg, Corporate
- Tanvi Arora, Corporate
- Gargi Bohra, Corporate
- Arnav Mohanty, Dispute Resolution
- Radhika Gupta, Dispute Resolution
- Anindya Roy, Funds
- Jayesh Varavadekar, Intellectual Property
- Shwetank Tripathi, intellectual Property
- Sunaina Brahma, intellectual Property
- Sunil Yadav, intellectual Property
- Udita Kanwar, intellectual Property
Delhi
- Aman Singh Baroka, Competition
- Bhavna Pattanaik, Corporate
- Pragalbha Priyakar, Corporate
- Shriya Nayyar, Corporate
- Aayush Jain, Dispute Resolution
- Ishan Khanna, Dispute Resolution
- Mohit Oommen, Dispute Resolution
- S Mohammed Raiz, Dispute Resolution
- Nikesh Tyagi, Energy, Infrastructure & Resources
- Prashant Kumar Singh, Energy, Infrastructure & Resources
- Siddharth Godha, Real Estate
Comments
From what I could see, 4 Partners, 1 Counsel, 3 Principal Associates & 4 Senior Associates from NUJS! Way to go!
Well deserved Rohit
That is discriminatory and shameful
No deserving candidate in KCO is ignored for promotion on basis of 'sex'
Do you disagree? What is the rationale for discriminating on the basis of 'sex'? Especially for promotions?
Many men and women definitely believe that there is considerable 'sex' based discrimination against men. Very disadvantageous on multiple occasions
I'm not commenting on discrimination in KCO or any other firm at all. But this comment on 'female privilege' is sheer blind! I can't stop laughing.
- availability of creches, solid maternity leave policies, or how career breaks or sabbaticals are integrated in a firm,
- very soft cultural issues, such as partners preferring if fee-earners don't work from home,
- the way sexual harassment claims are dealt with (or not),
- the lack of female role models or mentors at senior levels,
- the lack of women at senior levels who can push for some of the above, etc...
I don't have hard stats to hand about graduate recruitments, but anecdotally from conversations, graduate recruitment at the most junior levels has tended to be much more even between genders - perhaps someone has has recent information can confirm more accurately (and law schools have also in recent years begun to show a gender bias towards men: https://www.legallyindia.com/lawschools/digging-the-nirf-2020-law-school-rankings-most-llbs-have-big-gender-deficit-except-ail-kiit-sls-nliu-makes-good-case-for-more-reservations-llms-dominated-by-women-except-nls-20200616-11485 )
Also, interestingly, last year Khaitan & Co managed to promote a few more women than men: https://www.legallyindia.com/lawfirms/khaitan-promotes-11-to-partnership-and-more-than-50-are-women-20190405-9981
But the real clincher is that many other successful and high performing firms, such as AZB or SAM have much more 'normal' gender ratios than Khaitan or Trilegal, for instance, so it's clearly possible: https://www.legallyindia.com/india-unleashed-editorial/women-in-indian-law-firms-in-a-growing-minority-20190601-11000
1. Do you accept that women graduating from law school are, on average, are as good at being lawyers as men?
2. Are women who have spent 10 or 20 years in the profession, on average, as good as men at being lawyers?
3. If so, why are there apparently a lot more men than women who have stayed at firms like Khaitan for 10 or 20 years, to be eligible for partnerships? If there is a gender ratio at that seniority of 1 woman for every 5 men, then it may be hard to find enough women to even promote.
4. One reason could be cultural: i.e., a boys' club or policies that systematically excludes / discriminates against women (even if only subconsciously), which results in women dropping out before they get to the seniority to be eligible for partnership.
5. That creates a vicious cycle: by having fewer women in leadership roles, you end up with more of a boys' club, and correspondingly more women dropping out before getting to leadership roles, and therefore fewer women who get promoted to partner.
6. There are several things a firm can do to address that issue: try to gradually change things from the bottom down and hope that in 10 or 20 years things will be different. Or, change things from the top down, by making a conscious effort to identify and groom more women for leadership roles.
7. Even if this might give women some minute advantage vis-a-vis an equivalently qualified male candidate, most male candidates would have had the benefit throughout their career of the boys' club and gender imbalance at senior levels across the firm.
If you disagree with any of these points, please do share your counterarguments.
You just explained exactly what Kian said at #4 - by giving an example of a policy that systemically (and subconsciously) excludes women from the work force.
Discrimination would be
If 10 lawyers with the SAME experience i.e. number of years and in same TIER of LAW FIRM (Quantity and Quality)
Are up for promotion.
And the RATIO of women not promoted is significantly different from the RATIO of men not promoted
This would be on basis of 'gender' and not competence
Unfortunately, people jump to conclusions without any analysis of this sort
Opportunistic women (not all women are such but there are a quite a few of them)
Scream gender equality to further their own ambitions and career,
This is corroborated empirically by the number of 'likes' to the 'sex'ist comment
Of course, no one can make such socially 'INCORRECT' 'INTOLERABLE' statements publicly
There are COUNTLESS men who have suffered due to 'FEMALE PRIVILEGE'
What happens to these activist women then. Ever heard them screaming 'female privilege'
This gender diversity and accommodation is bullshit.
If you don't get it at your respective homes (from your husband and in-laws)
Then how can you expect a 'business' to 'care' more for you?
Creche and Maternity leave are ALWAYS provided.
The worst possible nightmare? You will be laid off during pregnancy (which is illegal)
Maybe you take a year off
But ask recruiters or partners - there is SERIOUS dearth of competent lawyers between PQE 2-8 years.
Most likely you will be reproducing through this period
Anyone will recruit you
Also, lets not blame men
Women also do not want you to work from 'home'
Every partner (irrespective of gender) is a slave driver
And wants to extract maximum juice from its resources
Sexual harassment doesn't happen everywhere and in all teams - it is RELATIVELY rare
But on the contrary FEMALE Privilege is much more widespread. A moment of silence to the victims
Especially those who were made to work long nights endlessly
While their sexually 'harassed' colleague was chilling with friends and watching movies
Change your team. There are unlimited opportunities out there for you. Provided you are COMPETENT
Stop with the whining. If you are good on merit then you will get recognized. The whole gender bias argument has, thanks to people like you, become weak because while many have genuine concerns, some just use this as an easy way to get what they may not get if merit was a consideration.
Love from 'the ladies'
2. What kind of targets?
3. Do they listen?
Alternatively, go through the NIRF submissions (not the ranking but the data and see what sort of placements have been made by different colleges). But the safe list would be: NLS, NALSAR, NUJS, NLUJ, NLIU, NLUD and GNLU.
If you get into either of these colleges (and please disregard the NIRF rankings) and do reasonably well, you should be in a good position.
Of course, you could also consider GLC, Symbiosis Pune, ILS and JGLS. They each have their respective advantages and the first three have strong alumni bases, which could be of some help.
Good luck.
Having said that, do bear in mind (and I'm sorry in advance if I'm disabusing you of notions to the contrary) that your expectations from the colleges themselves (in terms of facilitating your preparedness for a job at firms) should be close to zero. With very few exceptions, most of the courses offered across these universities aren't great - most of your learning will be pursuant to your own initiatives, aided by on-the-job learning that you may (but aren't sure to) receive during the course of internships, and perhaps moots/publications.
What these colleges do offer you are, reputation (yes, brand does matter), possibly a benevolent alumni base to draw upon, peers of above average intelligence (but many of whom may be exceptionally smart and well read for their age), and decent infrastructure in terms of libraries, subscriptions to legal databases, etc. How you leverage all of these will be up to you; but expect very less/no institutional support.
Oh! not to forget the third one who has the complete Harry Potter series.
Book Sizes!! Mehhhh.
"We are in a good place. We have so much work that we have made more partners. The pandemic has not affected us"
Meanwhile, others from the same building suffer because the greedy ones snatched their food.
Can someone please clarify on this ? And also justify this unfairness ?
Cheers.
They have a formula which is something like this:
42L - 6x - 12y
(Where "x" is months of life expectancy & "y" is months closer to a burnout)
Newly appointed Partners have a 'better' deal.
1.75 x deal for PAs
Per annum, of course.
Making deals with the Devil. What did you expect?
Congratulations to all those promoted :) Don’t let the soreness in the comments bother you - every promotion is well-deserved!
The only lawyers worthy of respect are litigating lawyers. They do quality work, application of mind and after a few years of practice they earn loads of money.
We only look at people such as Harish Salve and other big names. But there are 1000s of lawyers practicing in trial courts and high courtts who easily earn 5-10 lakhs per month after 3-4 years of practice.
But sadly the truth is never publicised so that some people remain "ghochus" working for corporate firms.
WFH might be good for already working associates but what about the new associates ? When do they join? We have student loans to pay.
What's the worst that happens if you decide to not pay back your loans? You at best stall the banks through litigation and in the process learn some law. The richest people of this country have defaulted on loans or have not paid back.
Right now everything needs to be shut for atleast 1 year. You live to earn another day. Life is long enough. Don't worry. One year doesn't matter so much.
You could be more thoughtful next time.
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Almost all associates at Platinum were disappointed when he left for KCO and his exit started the exodus at Platinum.