L&L Partners co-founder and former senior partner Mohit Saraf, who had won a Rs 77 crore-value settlement in a protracted arbitration and Delhi high court dispute and separation with fellow co-founder Rajiv Luthra, will announce the setting up of his own rival firm today, we understand according to multiple market sources.

Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas Bengaluru-based equity partner Arjun Lall, who had been with the firm for 20 years since graduating from NLSIU Bengaluru in 2001, has now officially left the firm.

Bengaluru-based Tatva Legal co-founding partner Manav Nagaraj will be joining Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas (SAM) with his team, including partner Bhargava KS, we have reliably learned.

NLSIU Bengaluru has scooped as its new registrar the dean of BML Munjal University’s law school, Prof Nigam Nuggehalli, alongside a raft of another batch of four lateral faculty hires who have joined recently, and two more who are due to join: Arun Thiruvengadam from Azim Premji and Saurabh Bhattacharjee from NUJS Kolkata.

The general counsel (GC) of Tata Sons, Shuva Mandal, is set to exit for Mumbai-based start-up law firm Anagram Legal, which we understand he has been instrumental in setting up, according to three sources with authoritative knowledge of the news.

Khaitan & Co has announced that it would open an office in Chennai later this year with a relocation from Mumbai and the hiring of dispute resolution independent counsel Arva Merchant as a local partner in the city.

IndusLaw may have been growing leaps and bounds, including by recently breaking into the cozy top-tier capital markets club and having been one of the more aggressive lateral hirers in recent times, but the firm’s starting salary had somewhat lagged behind compared to the highest-paying firms.

Against the backdrop of Brexit and vaccine diplomacy the United Kingdom and India yesterday agreed to a deal to increase investments by $1.39bn and to work on a longer-term bilateral free trade deal between the countries (dubbed an “Enhanced Trade Partnership”), as widely reported.

IC Universal Legal last week opened an office in the Gujarat International Finance Tec-City (GIFT), with Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas, hot-on-its-heels, announcing today that it had also done so.

Khaitan & Co has internally rolled out a set of guidelines to improve staff and fee-earners’ well-being as the pandemic has caused turnovers and workloads to grow, while traditional physical office support networks and the ability to switch off have largely disappeared for many.

The Bangalore head of Nishith Desai Associates’ office, Parag Srivastava, has joined has joined Rajaram Legal in the city as its third partner there.

IndusLaw’s capital markets team, which had been poached nearly lock-stock-and-barrel from L&L Partners in 2019, has won its highest-profile mandate to date in its role for the banks on the upcoming and eagerly-awaited Zomato initial public offering (IPO).

Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas has hired L&L Partners Delhi-based corporate practice partner Samarth Gupta as a partner who had resigned in October of last year.

L&L Partners Delhi-based real estate partner Sachit Mathur is understood to have tendered his resignation.

J Sagar Associates (JSA) has promoted seven principal associates to retained partner level (equivalent to salaried partner).

Khaitan & Co has promoted a total of 22 principal associates and counsel to salaried partner positions.

As many firms had frozen salaries (or recently unfrozen them), Trilegal has paid out an unconditional one month’s extra salary to all fee-earners and staff, on top of expected usual performance-related bonus payments and scheduled PQE increments, two sources with knowledge of the move have confirmed.

Khaitan & Co adding VoxLaw managing partner Udayan Choksi as a partner in indirect tax.

Clifford Chance Singapore capital markets and India group partner Rahul Guptan is set to join White & Case, according to two sources with knowledge of his move.

L&L Partner Damini Bhalla, who we had reported last week had resigned from the firm, is joining rapidly-growing food delivery unicorn Zomato as its general counsel (GC).