Reassessing The Governance Of Foreign Law Firms In India: Challenges And Opportunities For Cross-Border Legal Practice
- IJLLR Journal
- May 14
- 1 min read
Snigdho Biswas Soumi Ash, Department of Law, University of Calcutta
ABSTRACT
Globalisation has fundamentally reshaped the legal services market. The steady economic growth is accompanied by increasing demands of international lawyers and foreign firms for cross-border services. With India's continuing image as a land suitable for globalisation, the future of the legal profession is crucial in terms of the regulatory framework and how the future turns out for foreign firms and lawyers. Examining the press release by the BCI with the laid-down regulatory framework for the foreign firms and lawyers. Although, the BCI guidelines strictly prohibit foreign practitioners from appearing before the Indian courts, tribunals, and statutory bodies, they have permitted non-litigious fields such as international law, foreign law, and arbitration matters to some extent. Identifying the key challenges arising from the release and addressing the ambiguity in the international legal practice with comparative regulatory models from Singapore, Hong Kong, and the UK, and the judicial developments. Evaluating the market competition regarding the legal field, the global mobility of Indian lawyers, and the possibility of foreign firms collaborating with Indian firms. By offering a structured assessment of the 2025 regulatory landscape and proposing pathways for balanced liberalisation.
