The Hindu : National : Britain for more cooperation with India in legal services

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Sep 22, 2004

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Britain for more cooperation with India in legal services

By J. Venkatesan

NEW DELHI, SEPT. 21 . The British Minister for Constitutional Affairs, David Lammy, has called for greater cooperation with India in the legal profession in the context of globalisation and internationalisation of services.

Talking to The Hindu here today, he said "the British Government is committed to the promotion of the internationalisation of legal services." As a result now Indian lawyers could set up law firms in the United Kingdom but could not practise advocacy in courts.

He said foreign lawyers had set up firms in Japan, Korea, Malaysia, China and Thailand. The dramatic growth of India's economy had led to a significant demand from international businesses, including from law firms in U.K., to have partnership and cooperation with Indian law firms.

He made it clear that "they don't want advocacy in courts but only joint venture for corporate work".

Foreign law firms

When it was brought to his notice that the Bar Council of India had opposed the entry of foreign law firms, he said, "the mood is now changing." At a time when the Indian and British Prime Ministers had signed an understanding for greater cooperation, it was essential that the legal service sector was also opened up for the international community.

"If international trade and business is to expand to everyone's benefit, including India's, businesses must be confident of their ability to source high quality professional services wherever in the world they seek to operate. What we are seeking is better access to global markets for our lawyers to enable them to provide services to international business and investors in any country where there is a demand for them," he said.

Mr. Lammy is on a six-day visit to India in the backdrop of an agreement recently reached by members of the World Trade Organisation to re-invigorate the Doha Development Agenda multilateral negotiations. He met the Union Commerce Minister, Kamal Nath, the Union Minister of State for Law, K. Venkatapathy, senior lawyers and officials and discussed further development of links between the U.K. and Indian legal services industry.

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