The Bar Council of Delhi (BCD) has issued notice to the Big Four accounting firms in a complaint filed by Society of Indian Law Firms (Silf) president Lalit Bhasin (read order below).

Bhasin told us last week that it was not a new complaint, but that the BCD had only now taken it up. We had reported way back in 2015 that Silf had served written notice on the Big 4, and had lodged a complaint with the Delhi bar council, shortly as the successor-cause to Silf’s fight against foreign law firms.

Silf and Bhasin allege, as they have for a long time, that the CA firms have been practising law illegally.

The BCD has been served with KPMG and Deloitte having filed responses.

E&Y and PwC have six and four weeks respectively to file replies.

Bhasin said that KPMG and Deloitte had responded, inter alia, that the BCD had no jurisdiction to regulate them, because they were not lawyers.

BCD has directed the four firms to supply it with a list of advocates “engaged by them, in any capacity, in any of their offices at any place”, and, cryptically, in the same sentence, “they are also directed to refrain themselves from indulging in any such practice until further orders”.

The next hearing is scheduled for 12 July 2019.

For more, read:

• Lawyers vs CAs: Who would win a professional death match? LI asks CAs, GCs & partners

Correction 00:28: The initially published version of this story had erroneously stated that the Bar Council of India (BCI) passed the order, when it was, in fact, the Delhi bar council.

BCI serves show cause on Big 4