Exclusive: SN Gupta & Co has rebranded its transactional practice to SNG & Partners, shifted into new Delhi corporate offices and has hired former Ashurst India office heads Ashok Mubayi and Preet Malik as senior advisers to build up the firm’s nuclear practice.

Luthra & Luthra was the most active project finance legal advisers both by value and volume in the first half of 2010, followed by India Law Services, SJ Law Advocates & Solicitors, Amarchand Mangaldas and AZB & Partners and SN Gupta & Co, according to data compiled for Legally India by data provider Dealogic.

SN Gupta & Co has kick-started its sports practice by advising on the $333m (Rs 1,533 crore) buy of the Indian Premier League’s (IPL) new Kochi team by the Rendezvous Sports World consortium.

SN Gupta & Co is launching its Mumbai litigation practice with the hire of former MLS Vani & Associates senior associate Hiren Mehta as a partner, who will look to building a practice of 10 lawyers in the firm’s new High Court office.

United Arab Emirate (UAE) firm Musthafa & Almana is starting up to four offices in Kerala and South India.

SN Gupta & Co has hired Planning Commission consultant Rashi Anand Suri as a partner to start up the firm’s infrastructure and projects practice.

SN Gupta & Co has started up an M&A practice in Mumbai by hiring a Khaitan & Co senior associate as a partner and an associate from Hemant Sahai Associates.

The firm has also taken on new office space in Mumbai and plans to build a litigation team.

Two SN Gupta partners argue that the Securitisation Act is flawed without an effective Central Registry, which has still not been created almost seven years since first envisaged.

SN Gupta & Co and one-year-old start-up India Legal have advised on Duet India Hotels’ Rs 120 crore ($26m) fund investment in a Hyderabad hotel project with L&T Phoenix Infoparks.