Amazon lawyer says he was empaneled by AZB; work, payment of fees was done through firm

One of the lawyers being investigated in relation to the alleged funnelling of legal fees into bribes paid to government officials by Amazon has claimed that AZB & Partners was in charge of all the payments made to the retail giant's lawyers in India..In a legal notice sent to The Morning Context, lawyer Vikas Chopra has said that he was engaged to represent Amazon through AZB. Chopra has categorically stated that the legal fee he received from the law firm for professional services is fully documented. He has further denied the allegation that the legal fee paid to him was used for bribing government officials, stating that such an allegation was completely baseless and untenable.In the legal notice, he stated,"The fee bills of my client are also raised to AZB (and not to Amazon). Even for the assignments given by clients which are to be handled by him across the country by appointing location advocates, the entire information is always given to AZB with bills for expenses. With respect to the professional fee received by my client and expenses incurred for the litigation relating to Amazon, the entire amount is duly accounted for through proper documentation." .The notice served through Advocate Sanjay Dua thus calls upon Morning Context to take down the article and to issue an unconditional apology to Chopra, failing which defamation proceedings would be initiated against it..Who is Vikas Chopra?.As per the legal notice, Vikas Chopra graduated from Delhi University in 1999 with a first division degree and later completed his Masters in Corporate Laws from Indian Law Institute in 2004. He has been a member of the Bar Council of Delhi since 2002. .He has appeared in matters for both Central and State governments, several banks, PSUs and a host of other private companies. He has 12 advocates and paralegals supporting his litigation practice across the country..Last week, it was reported that Amazon Inc was investigating the role played by Indian lawyers in the alleged funnelling of legal fees into bribes paid to government officials..As per the allegations made by a whistleblower, Amazon Senior Corporate Counsel Rahul Sundaram was sent on leave pending the investigation. Sundaram was with Amazon since 2015..We have reached out to AZB & Partners and Chopra for comment.