The Bar Council of India (BCI) has to examine and recommend solutions for concerns raised by Indian law firms and lawyers over foreign lawyers and law firms being allowed to practise in India.
Both Indian and foreign lawyers and law firms had expressed appreciation as well as concerns for the move. Common concerns included privacy, ethics, advertising rules, time limits, and high costs, citing that these areas needing more clarity and possible revision.
Cyril Shroff, the managing partner of Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas, will be chairman of the six-member committee.
Other committee members are Ajay Bahl, managing partner of AZB & Partners; Suhail Nathani, managing partner of Economic Laws Practice; Sandip Bhagat, partner S&R Associates; Mahesh Agarwal, managing partner of Agarwal Law Associates; and Amit Kapur, partner at JSA. Srimanto Sen, principal secretary of the BCI, will be the committee’s convenor. BCI chairman Manan Kumar Mishra will be a special invitee to the committee.
The committee has been tasked to:
- Look into existing rules and suggest improvements for clarity, consistency or efficacy.
- Formulate safeguards to prevent foreign lawyers and firms from avoiding the applicable restrictions and practice Indian law through alliances, referrals or partnerships.
- Propose ways to ensure that Indian lawyers and law firms are not at a competitive disadvantage and to recommend measures of training, technology, infrastructure and strategic growth to strengthen and protect the interest of law firms for gradual evolution to global competitiveness.
- Evaluate the need for providing Indian law firms with comparable flexibility in areas such as the firm’s structure, capital and operational models, ensuring an equal footing with foreign counterparts, establishing a level playing field and creating an environment encouraging of pursuing global aspirations.
- Ensure that revisions uphold the professional character of law practice in India and reaffirm that legal services are personal services rooted in fiduciary responsibility, client trust and duties to the court, and are not subject to commercial enterprise norms.
The committee is required to execute the above in consultation with other law firms. The BCI chairman can also appoint other special invitees such as BCI members, representatives of foreign or Indian law firms, senior lawyers, former judges or other such experts to the committee for assistance.
The committee meetings will start in August 2025 and its final report shall be due up to 40 days after commencement of these meetings.
