Live: The Budget 2012 speech is kicking off at 11am and Legally India will blog it live. What do you think it holds for lawyers and clients? Hike service tax for lawyers or abolish it? Increase FDI? Vodafone, round 27? DTC news? Tinker with near-unusable LLPs? Massive tax benefits for all? Damp squib? Share your thoughts and follow our live blog.

Exclusive: Vaish Associates Delhi-based senior associate Sachit Jolly will relocate to Mumbai to start the firm’s direct tax law practice in Mumbai.

”) 11:00am The Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee’s 2011 India Union budget has just started after having been approved by cabinet. This blog will begin in earnest once the budget is over and we can get reactions from lawyers. In the meantime, IBN Live has a nice live blog page with a fast video and text updates. Please post your comments and thoughts on the budget below in the meantime.

J Sagar Associates (JSA) has engaged former Income Tax Commissioner and the first Director General Competition Commission of India (CCI) Amitabh Kumar as a senior advisor to augment its competition and direct tax law practices in Delhi office.

AZB & Partners senior associate Sunil Jain has joined J Sagar Associates (JSA) Delhi office as a partner to head and start up its direct tax practice.

Today’s Budget has introduced measures to give greater certainty to advance tax rulings to avoid litigation, which has been cautiously welcomed by Indian tax lawyers as appealing particularly to foreign investors.