Pulse Tracker | Liberalization of Indian Legal Space

‘Will they, won’t they?’ It’s been a talking point for several years now, but finally it looks like they will. On 15 March 2023, the Bar Council of India announced that international law firms (ILFs) will be permitted to set up shop in India. Some in the industry saw it as a bolt from the blue while others breathed out and began preparing for big changes.

Our view is that the BCI Rules were the first step towards liberalisation. The rules are in force but will be operational only when the registration process is initiated. It may be a while before the clouds part for good: we expect to see further clarifications, procedures and legal challenges. We’re giving it around 12 months for the dust to settle.

In this series, we’ve attempted to distil insights from our research to arrive at a forecast about what the future could look like for different segments of the ecosystem.

This is a shorter version of a much longer forecast, reach out to our team to learn more about the current landscape. We’ve left out sections that examine the impact on Law Schools, ADR Institutions, Legal Tech & ALSPs, Impact Organisations and citizens. The legal industry will no doubt be heavily influenced by the way global economic winds are blowing. And no analysis in 2023 is complete without a hat-tip to Artificial Intelligence and acknowledging the seismic impact it can have on the future of legal work.

It’s likely that our forecast overestimates the short-term impacts of liberalisation and underestimates the long-term ones. But we’ll keep updating you as we talk to people, carry out research and decode developments. If the proposed liberalisation eventually proves to be a false start, as it has before, some of this analysis may be inapplicable for the time being. But then we can remember the words of speculative fiction writer William Gibson: “The future is already here, it’s just unevenly distributed.”

Stay tuned and keep visiting this space as we continue to bring you the latest updates and resources needed to capitalize this opportunity.