SEBI’s legal officers, Vaneesa Abhishek and Aayush Mohata, who were hired in 2013 as expert counsels to render legal opinions on securities market and handle litigations, have recently resigned from the regulatory body.

Vaneesa is now pursuing corporate counseling and is practicing independently in Bombay High Court while Aayush will be joining Khaitan & Co’s Securities, Capital Markets and Corporate team.

Vaneesa is a graduate of NLU Jodhpur and did her Masters from New York University. Before joining SEBI, she was working with Amarchand Mangaldas and prior to that with Majmudar & Partners. At SEBI, she was in its Legal Affairs Department and was also part of Justice N K Sodhi Committee, which dealt with revamping insider trading law in India.

Aayush is a graduate of GNLU Gandhinagar and did his Masters from Queens Mary, University of London. Prior to joining SEBI, he worked with Chitale & Chitale Partners. Aayush will be the latest addition to Khaitan & Co; just last week the firm absorbed former PXV Partners Deepto Roy, Mohit Abraham and Thomas Phillippe.

Interestingly last year current SEBI Chairman U K Sinha, had hired 75 officers as part of an initiative to beef up its headcount for faster and more effective execution of newly granted powers to SEBI under Securities Laws Amendment Ordinance. However, lawyers were left out of this recruitment drive.

According to Economic Times, this had left the capital market lawyers wondering why SEBI had changed the trend of hiring lawyers, a practice set by its former Chairman M Damodaran, and continued by his successor C B Bhave.

There are suggestions that the new finance minister, noted lawyer Arun Jaitely, may ask SEBI to initiate a mass recruitment drive for lawyers soon.