J.Sagar Associates has hired a Partner for its direct tax practice in Gurgaon. Sunil Jain [pictured], formerly a Senior Associate with AZB & Partners in Delhi, joined J.Sagar yesterday to start up the firm's direct tax practice.. Jain, a commerce graduate, who also qualified as a Company Secretary and Chartered Accountant, in addition to his law degree, was independently handling international tax issues for AZB's Mumbai, Bangalore and Delhi offices.

J.Sagar has already established a presence in the indirect tax arena with the hire of Khaitan Partner Ashok Dhingra and his team earlier this year. Several firms have been moving in the direction of an indirect tax practice lately. AZB, for example, hired indirect tax Partner Suresh Varanasi and his team from KPMG in September, while Vaish Associates, which already has a flourishing indirect tax practice under Partner Shammi Kapoor, expanded its practice with the hire of two senior associates from Lakshmi Kumaran & Sridharan in October.

Jain's recruitment marks the advent of J.Sagar into direct tax. Speaking to Bar & Bench, Sunil Jain explained, "A lot of the direct tax work that J. Sagar has been receiving, has an international and non-resident tax bent. Our aim is to establish a direct tax practice which can handle transactional tax advisory. But we also plan to expand into domestic tax advisory, so that we can provide our clients with the entire range of tax advisory services, and not merely one aspect, such as transactional tax."