Kochhar & Co added ALMT Legal partner Gautam Bhatikar as a senior partner and co-head of the Mumbai office of the firm. Bhatikar has joined the firm with ALMT senior associate Zoeb Cutlerywala.

The seven largest law firms in India have grown their headcounts by an average of around 20% in the last one-and-a-half years. Of those, the fastest-growing such as Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas and Khaitan & Co, had expanded fee-earner headcounts by 45% and 35% respectively, while others such as AZB & partners’ partnership ballooned by 75%.

Economic Laws Practice (ELP) added former Ashurst London senior associate Akshay Kishore as an associate partner in Mumbai.

Economic Laws Practice (ELP) Chennai head and partner Karthik Sundaram left the firm on 14 October to go into counsel practice, around 14 days after former managing partner Rohan Shah formally retired from the firm to become a counsel.

As first reported by us in August, two PwC indirect tax experts have now joined in partner-equivalent positions as executive and associate directors in Mumbai.

Argus Partners merged with Mumbai firm P&P Legal, adding its founding partner Prakash Panjabi as an equity partner and Panjabi’s son and the other P&P Legal partner Pritish Panjabi as a partner in its Mumbai office.

Siddharth Raja, who was a co-founder of Narasappa, Doraswamy & Raja that later became Samvad Partners, will join Argus Partners in Bangalore as a senior partner and national executive director, with a remit to also oversee the firm’s Chennai practice.

Economic Laws Practice Mumbai associate partner Sumit Rai left the firm in October to go into counsel practice.

Luthra & Luthra Mumbai senior banking and finance partner Vijaya Rao is now an of counsel working part time with the firm.

Luthra & Luthra Delhi projects partner Rajesh Chavda has left the firm.

Kochhar & Co has added Gulf-based lawyer Nikhat Sardar Khan as a partner in its Dubai office.

HSA Advocates added former Apollo Tyres global chief legal counsel Atulya Sharma as a banking and finance partner, in Delhi.

Link Legal India Law Services has hired AZB & Partners senior associate Ashutosh Narang as an associate partner in its Mumbai banking and finance team.

MDP & Partners added former Elara Capital global legal head Rakesh Puri, as an associate partner and head of the firm’s banking and capital markets practice.

Dua Associates has reabsorbed its former fee earner R Ganesh, in its Chennai office as partner in the firm, after Dua’s Chennai partner Aarthi Narayanan left to join Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas.

HSA Advocates will beef up its small Kolkata outpost with two partners: former Argus Partners co-founder Ramya Hariharan and Paras Kuhad Associates (PKA) litigation partner Prateek Ghosh, who heads up PKA’s office, we have confirmed from authoritative sources aware of their moves.

Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas equity partner Kalpataru Tripathy has resigned from the firm, according to two authoritative sources.

Kochhar & Co has hired Sarika Raichur as a partner in Delhi focusing on corporate and private equity, merging part of the firm she had started.

According to the allegations in the Bombay high court section 9 petition against former Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas (CAM) Chennai partner Dorothy Thomas, Thomas “in direct collusion with” Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas instructed associates to “extract confidential files” of CAM’s “in a systematic and pre-planned manner” from 26 September before she and her team had resigned from the firm.

PDS Legal partner Deepak Chopra will join AZB & Partners in Delhi as a partner and the head of its tax litigation practice, according to a press release from the firm.