The recent implementation of the Bar Council of India (BCI) Rules for Registration and Regulation of Foreign Lawyers and Foreign Law Firms in India, 2023 marks more than just a regulatory shift: it reflects a pivotal philosophical moment in the evolution of India’s legal profession.
On its face, the move legitimises foreign firms’ presence in India to advise on foreign and international law. But underneath the policy, a deeper set of normative and structural questions emerge. What kind of legal market is India trying to build? Who will benefit from liberalisation, and who might be left behind?
For decades, India's legal services sector has been defined by protectionist policies. Much like the multinational accounting firms that were introduced to the Indian market post liberalisation, in the early 1990s, international law firms sought to gain access to the burgeoning market in India. Ram Jethmalani, India’s Law Minister in 1999, advocated for opening the market to foreign law firms, but his proposal was shelved due to political resistance. Since then, successive Law Ministers have avoided addressing the issue, though the Department of Commerce supported the reform, citing its potential for boosting professionalism and providing more choice for clients. However, the 1961 Advocates Act restricted the practice of law to Indian citizens, with the term "practice" left notably undefined.
While courts like the Bombay High Court (in the Lawyers Collective case) later interpreted this term expansively to include both litigation and transactional work, the lack of clarity allowed for informal liberalisation. Foreign firms have long engaged the Indian market through fly-in/fly-out models, best-friend referral agreements and India desks in global offices. These arrangements existed in a regulatory grey zone, tolerated but never fully embraced.
The 2023 BCI rules formalise a reality already in motion. Foreign firms have been operating through strategic surrogacy and indirect channels. The new rules offer transparency, but also surface long-simmering anxieties within the Indian Bar about sovereignty, professionalism and market disruption.
Opponents of liberalisation, particularly senior equity holders in legacy Indian firms and the Society of Indian Law Firms (SILF), often invoke a narrative of moral purity: law as a profession, not a business. But this binary is increasingly hard to sustain. Indian firms themselves have embraced business logics – expanding in size, adopting profit-sharing structures and operating with increasingly corporate ethos. The real concern is not about ethics; it's about power: who controls the profession, and who is allowed to compete?
This underlying contest becomes even more visible when one examines generational divides. Young lawyers, ambitious law students and start-up firms generally support foreign entry. For them, liberalisation means more jobs, better training and access to global standards. But their support is often muted; they fear retribution in a profession still governed by deference to seniority.
Further, much of the resistance to foreign law firms has been cloaked in a rhetoric of nationalism. But the average Indian citizen is unaffected by this issue; the political cost of liberalisation has been vastly overstated. The legal market is no longer a hermetically sealed domain. India’s commercial lawyers routinely work on cross-border transactions, advise multinational clients and operate in teams with foreign counsel. The fear of cultural or economic colonisation ignores the cosmopolitan nature of transactional lawyering today.
True integration into the global legal order requires more than regulatory permission. It demands a rethinking of legal education, ethics and equity. India must address internal asymmetries: the vast gulf between elite metropolitan firms and under-resourced regional bars; the opaque promotion practices of family-run firms; and the regulatory burdens that fall more heavily on domestic firms than incoming foreign ones.
Ethically, India must prepare to confront practices like lobbying and policy advocacy that are commonplace in other jurisdictions but viewed skeptically at home. Lobbying in India has long been seen as taboo in the legal profession, but it is increasingly being rebranded as "policy and government affairs." While foreign firms may bring institutionalised approaches to public law engagement, India must tread carefully in adapting these practices without compromising transparency or public interest safeguards.
Advertising, too, represents a significant shift. Indian law firms have historically operated under strict bans on advertising their services. The entry of foreign firms, which openly promote their capabilities and rankings, could accelerate pressure to modernise this aspect of regulation. However, any reform must also confront the reality that only some firms will have the resources to invest in professional marketing and brand positioning. Without safeguards, advertising could further consolidate visibility and client access among already dominant players, widening the gap between large corporate firms and smaller practices.
The legal profession must therefore ask itself: what are we protecting when we shield law from market forces? And are those protections equitable, or merely gatekeeping under another name?
Concerns about foreign domination are understandable but overstated. Foreign firms will not flood the Indian market overnight; they will likely proceed with strategic caution, mindful of costs, talent and competition. Moreover, the market has already spoken: international clients want seamless legal service, and Indian lawyers have proven they can meet that demand. But if India wants a legal profession that is globally competitive and locally just, it must not stop at allowing entry. It must reform the structures within.
Shubhangi Agarwalla is an attorney practicing law at a law firm in New York.