Kochhar & Co provides the full suite of dispute resolution services and has one of the largest litigation practices in the country, with 60 dedicated litigators. The pan-India litigation practice, with teams in Delhi, Gurgaon, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Mumbai, handles more than 300 cases annually. It recently established its seventh domestic office, in Chandigarh, and expanded its footprint in the US with the opening of an office in Chicago. The group’s mainstay is corporate and commercial litigation, with notable expertise in more specialist areas such as white-collar crime and intellectual property. The Kochhar lawyers often work in tandem on criminal cases and parallel civil proceedings. The firm’s litigators regularly argue cases themselves before courts and arbitral tribunals rather than instructing senior counsel in most matters. The firm has recently seen an uptick in debt restructuring litigation, joint venture and shareholders disputes between foreign corporations and their Indian partners, and complex trade and customs-related battles.
The robust dispute resolution team is led by chairman and managing partner Rohit Kochhar and includes senior partners Krishna Vijay Singh, Dhruv Wahi, Reena Khair and Rajarshi Chakrabarti.
In a landmark trade remedies matter, Khair and her team acted for Jubilant Ingrevia in an appeal filed before the Customs Excise and Service Tax Appellate Tribunal (the Tribunal) against an office memorandum issued by the Ministry of Finance (MOF) that decided not to impose anti-dumping duty even after a positive recommendation from the Directorate General of Trade Remedies. The Tribunal ruled in favour of the client and remanded the matter back to the MOF to reconsider its decision. The MOF preferred a writ petition before the High Court of Delhi. The Kochhar team was successful in obtaining an interim order form the High Court for the client, directing that all imports be provisionally assessed until the disposal of the writ. The Tribunal’s decision was landmark as it laid down the proposition that the decision of the central Government to impose or not to impose anti-dumping duty is subject to appeal and must be based on reasons. This is the first judgment passed by any court in India where the legislative functions of the central Government have been made subject to review in an appeal. It effectively curtails the power of the central Government to take decisions without following due process and removes any arbitrariness in the decision-making process of the central Government.
Skyline Innovation instructed the team for a delicate and sensitive matter involving Chinese loan mobile apps which were allegedly used to circumvent Indian laws to furnish online loans to thousands of Indian borrowers. The Indian police raided a call centre owned by the client and arrested a gang, which they said was responsible for the loan fraud. A Skyline director, a Chinese national, allegedly led the operation, used Skyline facilities to conduct the fraud, and threatened defaulters through Skyline call centres. On behalf of Skyline, the Kochhar team filed a writ petition in various High Courts and were able to secure the release of all employees who had been arrested.
The white-collar crime team was bolstered by the additions of partners Vaibhav Joshi, Samiron Borkataky and Ramasamy Santhanakrishnan and senior partner Christopher Manoharan last year. Santhanakrishnan arrived from Krishnan & Krishnan, Borkataky joined from Desai & Diwanji and Manoharan came from Sivanandaraaj & Partners. Former litigation partners Inder Raj Gill and Ankur Khandelwal left for an in-house role at One97 Communications and Saraf & Partners, respectively.
