Trilegal invites Meyyappan. N and Shalaka Patil to join the partnership in the tax and disputes practices

Trilegal, one of India’s leading law firms, today announced that the partnership had voted to invite two Partners – Meyyappan N. and Shalaka Patil – to join its tax and disputes practices, respectively. Both partners are expected to join Trilegal in the next few months at Mumbai. With this, the partnership strength of Trilegal grows to eighty-two (82). While this will be the first time in the recent past that the tax practice will add a new Partner, Trilegal has been aggressively growing its disputes practice, starting with inviting Nitesh Jain, who joined the firm as a Partner about 18 months ago and continuing with Siddharth Ranade who was elevated to the partnership as part of the internal promotions process in April this year.

Nishant Parikh, Partner and member of the management committee at Trilegal, said, “We are delighted to welcome Meyyappan and Shalaka. Both of them bring impressive capabilities to the firm. Meyyappan’s work on tax issues around emerging technologies and social finance will help us gain a competitive edge in these areas, whereas Shalaka’s experience in commercial litigation and arbitration will further strengthen our dispute resolution practice in Mumbai.”

Himanshu Sinha, Partner and Head of the Tax practice, Trilegal, said “We are delighted to welcome Meyyappan. With the continued growth in the technology backed sectors such as e-commerce, online media (audio and video streaming), gaming (skill games and gambling), and increasing digitization of the traditional economy, we expect technology related tax work to grow and Meyyappan will help us support clients in these areas and will give our practice a unique brand identity.”

Shankh Sengupta, Partner and Head of the Disputes practice, Trilegal, said, “We are excited to add Shalakha to our practice. Her diverse experience will help us address growing client demands and bolster the strength of our disputes team based in Mumbai.”

About Meyyappan. N and Shalaka Patil (incoming Partner)

Meyyappan. N has over 12 years of experience across a diverse practice portfolio encompassing digital taxation, international tax and social finance. He works on a mix of transactional, advisory, policy and litigation work and has advised a broad range of top technology, e-commerce, online media, gaming, crypto, and NFT companies on tax structuring, policy issues and litigation strategy covering international tax, income tax and GST. He has also built expertise in upcoming technology areas such as space economy, AR, VR and metaverse.

He has been regularly invited to speak at and chair panel sessions every year since 2016 on digital tax issues including relating to equalisation levy, Pillar I and Pillar II, cryptocurrencies, NFT, GAAR, MLI and OECD proposals at several conferences. He is a Member of the Bloomberg Tax Management International Forum Board, the International Fiscal Association Technical Committee, India Branch, and the National Tax Reporter, India, for the International Bar Association.

Shalaka Patil has over 12 years of experience with a focus on international and domestic arbitrations, general commercial litigations and disputes advisory services. She has acted for clients in a number of complex, commercial disputes involving shareholder rights (investor- promoter disputes), infrastructure, energy (oil & gas) and construction. She has advised on bilateral investment treaties too. Her primary focus has been in arbitrations – both institutional (SIAC, ICC, LCIA, DIAC, IMC) and ad-hoc seated in Mumbai, Delhi, Ahmedabad, Goa, Singapore, Zurich and London. She has acted for clients in court/tribunal/regulatory proceedings – at the Supreme Court, Bombay, Delhi, Gujarat and Calcutta High Courts, (district) and cooperative courts; and at consumer tribunals and the NCLT / NCLAT.

Shalaka was recognised by Legal500 in 2021 and 2022 for her work and is on the steering committee of Young MCIA for 2021-23. She regularly contributes to various publications such as – Getting the Deal Through, Conducting Litigation in India for Lexology, the Kluwer Arbitration Blog and the American Review of International Arbitration Blog of Columbia Law School. She has also authored an upcoming book on contentious issues in arbitration in India, published by Thomson Reuters.

About Trilegal

Trilegal is one of India’s leading law firms, with expertise across the full spectrum of corporate legal services. Trilegal has offices in four key cities of India. Trilegal has been recognised as the ‘Firm of the year’ for Client Service Excellence by Asia Law Awards 2021; “M&A Law firm of the Year”by VCCircle Awards 2020; ‘Law Firm of the Decade’ at the RSG Grow India Summit and Awards 2019; one of the most innovative law firms in Asia in the inaugural edition of ALB Trailblazers 2020 and ‘highly commended’ in the FT RSG Innovative Lawyers Awards 2020. Trilegal has also been recognised as one of the ‘Best Overall Law Firms in India’ as part of the India Business Law Journal Annual Indian Legal Awards 2021.