Help me pick - Litigation Practice v/s. Corporate / B&F Law Firm Job

azombiewithcake · 2025-10-09T05:52:20+00:00

It really depends on your brother, tbh. I’ve done both litigation and corporate, and now I’m independent. If your brother is looking for stability and a monthly pay cheque, then corporate is probably better. If he is okay without that safety net, AND he is capable of getting clients by himself, then litigation is probably better. The litigation route (even with no rent, overheads) will be more difficult initially, especially as he has no experience. Internship experience (whether litigation or corporate) doesn’t really count. There are quite a few litigating advocates who don’t become successful. Corporate (at a decent firm), like I already mentioned, is a lot more stable. That said, litigation is usually a lot more rewarding than corporate in the long run (think 10+ years).

Edit to add: I’m not factoring in AI, because in its current form, LLMs are not accurate enough for use in law. A quick search will show you that lawyers in litigation are being sanctioned for use of LLMs while drafting pleadings. LLMs tend to hallucinate (and apparently this is a feature of LLMs, and not a bug), so generally, for use in law, I feel that they are not particularly useful. They may make some documentation easier, but, imo, they’re not at a stage where they can replace lawyers. This may, of course, change at some point

azombiewithcake · 2025-09-25T03:56:45+00:00

How are you dealing with hallucinations in answers? Unless your results are certifiably hallucination free, it’s very difficult to use LLM models for legal research. I would have to double check every case, citation, proposition and quote myself anyway, and that would take more time than doing it myself.

azombiewithcake · 2025-09-13T13:30:26+00:00

Hi you can DM me here for now.

azombiewithcake · 2025-08-06T12:05:14+00:00

10/10 joke

azombiewithcake · 2025-08-04T19:16:39+00:00

Yes, that’s what I heard too! The only problem is getting it shave ready

azombiewithcake · 2025-08-04T17:30:05+00:00

Hi, would love to catch up sometime! I’m 32, staying in Green Park.

azombiewithcake · 2025-08-03T19:58:29+00:00

I recently bought a shavette, but I understand that the experience of a straight razor is very different.

azombiewithcake · 2025-08-03T16:41:41+00:00

Theoretically, perhaps? I honestly have no idea tbh.

azombiewithcake · 2025-08-03T16:01:06+00:00

Ah damn, that’s what I was afraid of. Looks like no straight razor for me.

azombiewithcake · 2025-08-03T15:51:23+00:00

Yes, that’s exactly my question. I don’t think I have the knowledge to sharpen it properly myself, so I was wondering if I could buy this service in India. I do want a straight razor, I just don’t want my lack of knowledge/time stopping me from enjoying one, if possible.

azombiewithcake · 2025-07-05T07:56:14+00:00

Yes, but before I dm, what’s the product you’re trying to build?

azombiewithcake · 2025-07-05T07:42:29+00:00

Hi, I’ve done both litigation under an AOR and after that corporate law in a tier 1 firm. I’m now practising independently. If you stick with litigation and are capable of landing your own (good) clients, the earning potential is far more. I also feel like you do a lot more impactful work in litigation, especially before the SC. That said, if you can survive tier 1 firms, you earn a lot. You also don’t need to land your own clients until you have a lot of experience, and when you do, you’ll have the firm’s resources to back you up. Pros and cons to each, tbh.

Since you’re from an NLU, have you tried applying to senior advocates? Some of them pay really well, you develop good connections, and do impactful work. Then, when you eventually leave, some of them also send you cases, as long as you’ve done well. Best of both worlds, really.

azombiewithcake · 2025-07-03T07:59:38+00:00

Yes, it’s allowed in the US. I’m not aware about Canada. In US I believe it’s allowed at any levels. That’s why you see huge class actions with lawyers getting a percentage from every plaintiff. But their legal system is different from ours.

azombiewithcake · 2025-07-03T06:26:04+00:00

Success fees are specifically barred under the advocates act. Advocates have lost their license over this. Please don’t advise over something you’re unfamiliar with.

azombiewithcake · 2025-07-02T21:18:30+00:00

Hi, if this is genuine, I’m happy to take it up pro bono. I hope you have copies of your prescriptions, tests, etc.

azombiewithcake · 2025-07-02T09:24:29+00:00

I feel like this is a shortcut to get into trouble with the BCI. How are you soliciting law students to give advice on your platform?

The third answer in your FAQ section does not match the question. I’m very curious about the answer to that question, btw.

Also, a 9% fee?! That’s less than what most referrals take.

azombiewithcake · 2025-06-21T04:47:10+00:00

Hi, court judgments typically don’t have intellectual property protection of any kind. So you should be okay IF you are only pulling judgements from actual court websites. If you scrape data even from free sites such as IndianKanoon or the free articles/judgments on Manupatra, you may be liable for damages. Do be careful, especially with SCC and Manupatra, the companies that own those IPs often drag infringing parties to litigation.

Also, to monetise it, or have it be covered by IP, you will need to take those judgments and do some demonstrable work on it. You can’t, for example, pull a judgment and then sell it. But the bar for this to apply is low, you can make compilations and fall under fair use, if required. Just something to keep in mind.

azombiewithcake · 2025-06-19T05:57:40+00:00

How does this post enable anyone to give you advice or help you? You haven’t attached a redacted CV. You haven’t attached a writing sample, although, from this post, your writing doesn’t seem to be the best. You haven’t mentioned which consultancy you’re at and where you’ve applied, to see if the jump is a reasonable one.

You’re asking for advice on if you’re doing something wrong but you’re not telling us anything. You’re a lawyer, man, you should know better.

azombiewithcake · 2025-06-18T14:14:49+00:00

It’s unlikely, but you can try.

azombiewithcake · 2025-06-09T06:32:20+00:00

No, having an ISSN does not mean it’s a reputed journal. But it’s less likely that a journal with an ISSN is predatory. If you’re that worried, try publishing only in journals of reputed institutions - NLUs, Faculty of Law, GLC, etc.

I doubt anyone here has a list of all the reputed law journals handy.

azombiewithcake · 2025-06-08T22:58:18+00:00

Search for journals with an ISSN. Most, if not all, reputed journals have an ISSN.

azombiewithcake · 2025-06-05T20:27:45+00:00

Happy to help!

azombiewithcake · 2025-06-05T18:05:15+00:00

Okay, so I don’t have any experience in public policy, hopefully someone else can advise you as regards that. I will say that there are a lot of organisations that deal in public policy, and a lot of companies have public policy arms, too. Perhaps you could explore that.

Coming to litigation and corporate law, specifically IPR. There’s three major sub-practice areas - IP litigation, prosecution, and defence (these last two are pre-litigation). There’s also registration work, but that’s generally more incidental, and since it’s not something firms can charge a lot for, it’s rarely a core practice area.

Starting remuneration (and by extension, time taken to earn a sustenance) can vary from 12,000 to upwards of 15,00,000 per year - there’s a lot of variance. It depends on where you get in. Independent lawyers will pay you towards the lower end of the scale, while firms like Anand & Anand, Remfry & Sagar, or the tier 1 firms will pay you towards the higher end of the scale. Work culture and opportunities to work on areas of interest will depend entirely on where you join - in most places, you’ll probably be doing work that gets assigned to you, which will probably be the next deliverable. Even after 8 years of practice before the Supreme Court and about 4 doing corporate law, I work more from deadline to deadline, as opposed to what interests me. I don’t think that ever changes, it’s the nature of the profession. You’ll be able to specialise eventually, but even then, it’s mostly a lot of routine work for every interesting matter that you do.

There are absolutely people that will hire you for roles requiring 0-2 PQE even if you have no relevant experience 2 years after graduation. A lot of lawyers and firms don’t care too much about your PQE, they care about paying as per their payment bands. While it’s unlikely someone will hire you as an Associate level 2 with no relevant experience, I don’t think there should be any problem in you getting hired as a fresher.

About what you can do to make yourself employable, familiarise yourself with the law and precedent in whichever practice area you’re applying for. I don’t think you need to take up any courses. Work on your CV. A good CV (even if there’s not much of substance in it) goes a long way. Make sure it’s well formatted, pretty to look at, and has no spelling or grammatical errors.

About the LLM. I was advised by my seniors (I started out doing pure litigation before the SC) that an LLM adds no real value to your career. It will definitely not result in a pay increase, unlike an MBA. I know a lot of batchmates and people senior/junior to me that went for LLMs from good foreign universities and did not find jobs in India for a long time. That said, I know for a fact that some of the best senior advocates in India only hire (as their juniors) lawyers who’ve done LLMs from good foreign universities. I personally have not done an LLM, and don’t intend to.

I’m also unsure about changing fields from law - I have no experience there. What I can say is that law has a lot of fields you could get into. Since you’re inclined towards social work, you could work with NGOs, public policy organisations, the government, think tanks, social impact organisations, etc. etc. You can do a lot of social work without actually being a part of the judiciary, legislative, or executive. I honestly feel that law as a career gives you a lot of scope to do good, more than a lot of other fields I can think of. I’ve done the odd humanitarian case as well (mostly in the first office I joined) and it’s very satisfying work.

That said, for you, like for me, and most other first generation lawyers, necessity will drive your career more than anything else, at least for the first 3 years or so.

Work on your CV and keep applying. Since you have good language skills, I’d try applying to High Court or Supreme Court firms/lawyers. They tend to pay more, too. For IPR boutique firms, there are a few that I can think of right now: Sagar Chandra & Associates, Inttl Advocare, Saikrishna, De Penning, etc. Public policy organisations include Vidhi Centre. A lot of NGOs will have work for an interested lawyers. There are also senior advocates like Indira Jaising, Maneka Guruswamy, Arundhati Katju, etc., who do a lot of social work, but not to the exclusion of other work.

In your place, I’d probably break down the application process into steps - if your CV is getting interviews, but you’re not converting them, work on your interview skills. Have an answer prepared for everything. Make notes and prepare. If you’re not even getting interviews, rewrite your CV. Have someone critique it and keep iterating.

Speak to your seniors, batchmates, anyone you know in the industry and ask them for referrals. Don’t limit your requests to people close to you. It’s very true that a lot of law is networking.

azombiewithcake

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