Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas (SAM) partner Ameya Gokhale, who joined the firm in recent months, is representing Nestle India on its judicial review of food safety watchdog FSSAI, which banned its Maggi instant noodles for allegedly containing too much lead and MSG.
A division bench of Justice VM Kanade and Justice BP Colabawala posted the matter for Friday after the company’s lawyer mentioned it in the court on Thursday. Earlier, the matter had been listed for June 18.
Gokhale specialises in Bombay high court litigation, and was practising in the chambers of Pradeep Sancheti after having left Khaitan & Co in August 2013 as a principal associate before joining SAM He had begun his career after graduating from NLSIU Bangalore in 2005 at the Cyril Shroff-managed Mumbai office of Amarchand Mangaldas, as it then was before the break-up of the firm into two halves run by Cyril and Shardul Shroff.
In a stock exchange filing, Nestle said: “As part of the efforts to resolve the Maggi noodles issue, Nestle India has today approached the Bombay high court, raising issues of interpretation of the Food Safety and Standards Act 2011 while seeking a judicial review of the order dated June 6, 2015, passed by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in Maharashtra and the order dated June 5 passed by FSSAI,” according to the PTI. “At the same time, we are continuing withdrawal of Maggi noodle products. This action will not interfere with this process.”
The Indian Express, which has seen a copy of the petition, wrote that Nestle claimed that its noodles’ tastemaker might only have contained naturally occurring glutamate, but not artificially added monosodium glutamate (MSG):
Pointing out that the Maggi tastemaker is not a standardised product, Nestle said all its ingredients are specified and regulated to be used under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2011. “Thus, the tastemaker cannot be classified in the residual category of ‘food not specified’ which has a tolerance of 2.5 ppm as majority of the ingredients used in the making have an individual tolerance limit of 2.5 ppm or more and a large number of ingredients have a tolerance of 10 ppm,” the petition said.
Hat-tip to @superselector5 and @aamirkhan_1987 on Twitter.
Comments
Usually depending on the matter he's ready to give some ad-interim relief, lets see what happens tomorrow.
Basically, either it's those two options you proffer, or as a third option consider you're not familiar with the kind of news LI has, does and should cover, or as a fourth option, you have an over-simplistic view of legal practice.
1. A new law firm, in a new city, got a litigation mandate with / for a new hire in a court that has been to-date dominated by the law firm CEO's brother, who has also been working hard on doing the same in Delhi.
2. A partner 'mentioning' the matter before court, usually involves more than that - on such an important case, the law firm, assisted by counsel perhaps, would have prepared the copy of the petition, done research on the laws, decided on overall litigation strategy, etc, etc.
3. Nestle will presumably pay SAM for the work they have done and will do on this.
4. Many more reasons if still not convinced why this is news.
On a serious note, I am not nobody to suggest the kind news LI has, does and should cover (hell, I'm just a reader, not the owner) but if fair and balanced legal news reporting was the objective, then three questions:
1. What about other smaller, but equally competent firms winning first time mandates? For instance, Veritas Legal is a newby with a new litigation partner in a court dominated by AZB and WG. Was their first new litigation mandate splashed prominently along with the photo and bio data of the partner handling the mandate? Hard to ignore the possibility that the reporting on LI has a big firm/corporate bent. Comment no. 14 suggests something similar (but without going "ad hominem").
In fact, in the last one week, many key developments have taken place in the Bombay High Court but smaller firms were involved. (Banning of Victorias, Refusal of bail to the arms haul case accused by the same judge who gave Salman Khan bail, legality of toll waiver for LMVs)
2. In addition to talking about the firm winning the mandate, why not report what actually happened in the matter? A fairly detailed hearing was held and order passed. The Court refused to stay the FSSAI's order because Nestle had voluntarily begun withdrawal of products? Some may be think that's news. Any reason why that was not as newsworthy to LI as the new firm's and partner's achievements in getting the mandate?
3. Are you aware of who actually got the mandate? Comment no. 13 might contain a clue. Nestle India has a long standing relationship with a certain Ms. P and did not need to be won over by the new partner as might have been suggested in the article. In fact, it would have been news if Nestle went with CAM. Or if SAM started to represent some of CAM's long standing clients.
1. Tell us about it - we heard through this on Twitter and picked it up, but since we don't have someone full time in the Bombay HC, our coverage is admittedly patchy. So yes, please tell us about it (you can use the Contact page's form if you like, or just leave a comment marked 'not for publication' or tip.
2. Missed out on reporting it and would have liked to, but MSM was all over this case like a rash, so there was no dearth of available coverage...
3. The headline intentionally said Gokhale "handles" HC mandate for Nestle, rather than implying Gokhale procured it through his own relationships. But this is significant not because of the client, but because this might be the first time that a Shardul Bombay partner is acting on a matter that they would have traditionally cross-referred to AMSS Mumbai.
If you give us 1 day notice of really interesting things coming up in Bombay HC, we can get our Bombay part-time reporter Bapu Deedwania on the job also :)
If you have been following the FTIL / NSEL saga , you would be knowing that AMSS was handling the matters since quite some time. I can tell you that they have given their new case to Crawford Bayley, heard Sanjay Asher is handling the mandate but i'm not too sure.
what do you mean by 'court dominated by AZB?!? I'm sure most advocates know that anyday Mulla & MUlla, Crawford Bayley, Kanga have more matters listed in Bombay HC than AZB !!!!!!
@LegallyIndia can argue dat d notice bannin em in Maharashtra is issued by Bombay FDA. Art. 226(2) - jurisdiction where consequence ensues.
Ameet Datta @iphound2009:
@LegallyIndia @Loy_errr they are challenging the Maharashtra FDA order if I understood correctly so Bom HC would have jurisdiction.
While, Srilok Nath Ratha @snrath suggests:
@LegallyIndia NCR is terribly hot and monsoon has reached Mumbai.
:)
Supreme Court.
Also it's good to know that other people are also using the name Bombay Lawyer. :-p.