Events

About the event:-

India has regained the title as the fastest growing economy worldwide and all eyes are on them. Managing the legal landscape can be tricky if you face challenges in dealing with this emerging market, then join us alongside PwC and Squire Patton Boggs to hear from experienced professionals on how to navigate India’s legal landscape.

Event Program

1400 hrs – Registration

1420 hrs – 1435 hrs - Opening

Legal teams have a constant challenge in working the language on a contract or a negotiation and the actual requirement that a business often needs.

The challenge is multiplied when it comes to India. The business culture, the individual’s culture, and the organization culture is quite an array of color, much like India and no one model will fit the bill.

INDIA – How can legal departments get their head around to successfully working with their Indian stakeholders?

1400 hrs - 1500 hrs

Breaking into World Bank's Top 100 Ranking of Ease of Doing Business - legislative and regulatory changes that made the difference

1500 hrs - 1530 hrs - Changing paradigms of India's Exchange Control and Corporate law Framework.

1530 hrs - 1600 hrs - Tea Break

1600 hrs - 1645 hrs- Foreign Investment in India - Practical Challenges and Issues

Most foreign investors in India have to deal with the contradiction of the market. On the one hand, India is one of the fastest growing emerging markets and is politically more stable than in previous cycles, on the other hand, investors often have to deal with issues related to fraud, corruption and security. 

The panel will cover:-

- Fraud risk foreign investors will face

- The control of operations in India

- Corporate governance 

- Operating Practices and mitigation measures

- Accounting and audit standards

- Legal and Regulatory framework

1645 hrs - 1730 hrs - Navigating India's local licensing regime              

1730 hrs - 1800 hrs- Recent developments in Cross-Border Arbitrations and Mediation in India

The Indian economy has seen an increasing number of commercial disputes in recent times. Disputes in sectors including construction, energy, pharmaceutical, etc., are snowballing and becoming more and more complicated. Parties are increasingly turning to arbitration and mediation over traditional court litigation for cross-border disputes in India. Hear from experts in arbitration and mediation.

1800 hrs - Networking Drinks

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Speaker Profiles

Reshmi Khurana
Managing Director
Kroll

Reshmi Khurana is Managing Director and Head of South Asia in Kroll’s Investigations and Disputes practice, based in the Singapore office. Reshmi has more than 15 years of experience in the United States as well as in South and Southeast Asia conducting complex corruption investigations, litigation support projects, and due diligence on the management, operations, and business models of organizations. Her experience includes helping clients identify and bridge gaps in internal controls and corporate governance through people, processes, and technology.

Reshmi advises a wide range of clients, such as asset management companies and banks; corporations in the mining, oil and gas, consumer packaged goods, retail, and pharmaceutical industries; and law firms. Reshmi joined Kroll in 2003 in New York, where she worked for six years. She then moved to Kroll’s Singapore office, where she oversaw the operations in Southeast Asia before joining Kroll’s Mumbai office in 2011. Recently, she has led assignments in India, Indonesia, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal.

Prior to joining Kroll, Reshmi was a consultant with McKinsey & Company in India, where she advised clients on strategy and operations in the telecom, retail, and consumer packaged goods sectors.

Reshmi has a Master degree in Economics from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) and is an Independent Director on the Board of a leading international education institute in India.

Biswajit Chatterjee 
Partner
Squire Patton Boggs

Biswajit Chatterjee co-chairs our India Practice and leads the Capital Markets team in South East Asia. He is New York and India qualified and has extensive experience in corporate finance, capital markets, private equity and M&A transactions in Asia Pacific with a particular focus on India and South East Asia.

He has represented issuers and investment banks in a wide range of corporate finance transactions, including some of the largest equity and debt offerings in India and South East Asia. Bis has worked on complex, multijurisdictional private and public transactions, equity and debt deals, SEC registered, Rule 144A and Reg S offerings, private placements, ADRs and GDRs, MTN programs, FCCBs and high yield bond deals across a range of industries, including technology and e-commerce, infrastructure, engineering and construction, oil and gas, green energy, financial institutions, mining, real estate, retail and logistics.

Kaustubh George 
Senior Associate
Squire Patton Boggs

Kaustubh George is a senior associate within the Capital Markets and M&A Practice based in the Firm’s Singapore office. Kaustubh’s practice covers the diverse areas of capital markets, private equity, mergers and acquisitions and foreign investments and corporate commercial advisory.

He has represented and assisted both issuers and underwriters in India in fundraising through public offers, international issuances, private equity and venture capital funding. He has also been involved in drafting, reviewing and negotiating transaction documents for a diverse variety of mergers and acquisitions-related transactions.

Himansu Mohanty 
Executive Director, Regulatory
PwC India

Himansu Mohanty joined PwC in July 2016 after over 30 years of experience in various functional areas of the Reserve Bank of India including currency management, regulation of financial markets, government banking, etc.

He has been involved in administration of the exchange control regime in the mid 1980’s and with implementation of the transition from the FREA to FEMA regime in 1999-2000. He has been spearheading the liberalization and rationalization of the regulatory framework for cross border transactions during the last three years.

Between 2006 and 2013, he was involved in Reserve Bank’s monetary policy and exchange rate policy implementation as well as regulation of financial markets. During this period, he was closely involved in management of the massive surge in foreign exchange inflows during 2006-08, the down turn in market conditions post-Lehman, and the volatile conditions of 2013. He was a key official in formulation and implementation of Reserve Bank’s crisis response.During this period, he was also involved in various measures to develop the financial markets. Some of these are: introduction of exchange traded currency futures and options, interest rate futures, credit default swaps, etc.

During 2013 and 2016, he was instrumental in liberalization of the foreign investment regime. Besides, as head of the Forex Markets Division, he was also played a crucial role in liberalizing the regime for hedging foreign exchange risks, improving upon the cross border remittance regime, etc.

He has been associated with several working groups and committees on various matters relating to financial markets and institutions. He has been actively involved with Foreign Exchange Dealers’ Association of India, Fixed Income Money Market and Derivatives Association of India, and Forex Association of India and address several of their national and international conventions. His international exposure include IMF,FRBNY, BIS, Bank de France, Bank of Korea, Bank of Thailand, etc.

Himansu Mohanty has done his Masters in Economics from Delhi School of Economics and is a Certified Associate of Indian Institute of Bankers. He was a Visiting Fellow in the University of California during 2005-06 and among others, worked in the area of financial markets, institutions and risk management. 

Akash Gupt 
National Leader Regulatory
PwC India

Akash is a Partner & Leader of the Regulatory Service practice at PwC India where he has been for over 20 years. His current areas of expertise include providing advice to Clients and Governments on policies, regulations and economic legislations, besides matters relating to foreign investment policy, exchange controls, capital market regulations, insolvency, anti-trust regulations and relevant industry policy/ regulatory framework across sectors.

Over his 20+ years of professional career, he has helped companies set up new businesses, enter into joint ventures, undertake transactions, obtain licenses/ approvals, navigate new regulations and deal with regulatory disputes/ investigations.

He is also focusing on public policy advisory - helping companies navigate the policy maze, assess trends in changing landscapes, advice on strategy for stakeholder engagement, technical analysis of business impact of an upcoming regulation and also support business planning from a regulatory standpoint, which is becoming more and more relevant today with technological innovation, evolving business dynamics, changing political situations and resultant complex & volatile policy environment.

Akash is a law graduate and a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants. 

Devottam Sengupta
Senior Legal Counsel
Louis Dreyfus Company

Devottam Sengupta is a Senior Legal Counsel at Louis Dreyfus Company (LDC) Group, based in Singapore. He’s the global lead counsel for the Structured Trade Finance business of LDC Group, one of the largest traders of agricultural commodities. Additionally, Devottam is a part of the Asia-Pacific M&A team and the regional lead Treasury lawyer. He also supervises the India legal team at LDC.

Devottam extensive in-house and private practice, having previously worked as a regional counsel for Cargill Group, and as principal associate with Amarchand & Mangaldas (now Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas). During the course of his career, Devottam has worked on significant cross-border M&A, acquisition financing, structured hybrid financing, and distressed company M&A. 

A graduate of India’s premier law school, National Law School of India University (Bangalore), Devottam also holds a European Masters in Law and Economics, awarded jointly by the University of Hamburg and the University of Manchester. He was also the recipient of an Erasmus Mundus scholarship from the European Commission. 

In addition to being a lawyer, Devottam is also a writer and his translation to English of a Bengali novel was recently published. 

Hazel Tang - Centre Director

Hazel is an accredited mediator in Singapore and Shanghai.

Prior to joining Singapore International Mediation Centre, Hazel was a partner with a leading Singapore law firm with a regional presence, and was based in China for a period. Hazel’s experience cover a wide range of contentious and non-contentious work in the construction and infrastructure industry, and has effectively represented clients in international arbitration, litigation, adjudication and mediation proceedings.

Hazel also regularly conducted regular in-house training on risk prevention and mitigation.

Hazel is also an arbitrator with the leading arbitration institutions.

Click here to download the programme and speaker profiles.

*This seminar is strictly for in-house counsel.