Biography: Banking

Mr Shardul S Shroff is the managing partner of Amarchand Mangaldas. In practice since 1980, Mr Shroff has over 30 years of legal advisory experience. He is a leading authority on banking and finance, and a senior attorney and advocate-on-record of the Supreme Court of India.

Mr Shroff's practice in banking and finance is broad based, with extensive experience in acquisitions and takeovers, corporate, project and structured financing. He is regularly called upon by foreign and domestic corporations and financial institutions to advise them on complex corporate and finance matters and transactions. He is also an expert on legal matters related to special and mutual funds, general banking, security creation, bankruptcy and special recovery procedures.

In his career, Mr Shroff has been involved in many complex and high-profile transactions. Some of his recent experience includes – advising IFC in connection with ECB financing to Paradeep Phosphates for US$50 million; advising JK Paper on ECB financing from reputed international banks; and advising a leading telecom company in India on issues relating to mobile banking.

Besides doing all forms of bank borrowing and lending transactions for clients like IDFC, IFCI, ICICI, IDBI, RaboBank, Mr Shroff has extensively advised in matters relating to bank loan recovery actions, debt reconstruction proceedings before the Board for Industrial and Financial Reconstruction (BIFR), and asset reconstruction and securitisation under the SARFAESI Act. He has advised International Finance Corporation (W), ADB and other multi-lateral lenders before the BIFR in the Bihar Sponge and Modi Rubber cases.

He is a director on board the Infrastructure Development Finance Company Limited which is a Chennai-based financial institution involved in infrastructure, funds, private equity and project finance. He is presently a member of the CII national council on corporate governance & regulatory affairs 2011-12, CII task force on integrity & transparency in governance and CII national committee on dispute resolution - centre for mediation and conciliation. He is also the chairman of CII national committee on legal services for 2011-12, and the associate president of Society of Indian Law Firms (SILF). Mr Shroff is also on the panel of Indian Institute of Corporate Affairs (IICA) for the subject related to competition law.

On account of his expertise, Mr Shroff has been consistently rated as a leading lawyer by several international fora and publications, including Who's Who Legal, Asia Law, Chambers Global, Euromoney, and International Financial Law Review (IFLR) etc. He has also received the National Law Day Award from the president of India in November 2009 for his unique contribution to the field of corporate law.

Biography: Corporate Governance

Mr Shardul S Shroff is the managing partner of Amarchand Mangaldas. A senior attorney and advocate-on-record of the Supreme Court of India, with over three decades of experience, today he is considered a leading authority on corporate governance.

Mr Shroff regularly counsels boards and directors on corporate governance matters and actively participates in the Independent Directors Dialogue. He acts as an independent director on several leading companies listed on the stock exchange.

Over the years, Mr Shroff has participated in the formulation and drafting of several important economic legislations and company law reforms in India. He has also been on a number of high-powered committees appointed by the Indian government, including committees on various legislations. Some of the committees on which he has served include: the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) special task force on corporate governance, chaired by Dr Naresh Chandra; member of FICCI's M Damodaram committee; high-powered Naresh Chandra committee (2nd committee) (2003); high-powered JJ Irani committee (2006) that deliberated on the principles of corporate governance with reference to the new Companies Bill 2008.

During his career, Mr Shroff has been involved in many complex and high profile transactions, with the most recent being his involvement in Satyam Computer Services. He advised the reconstituted board of the company on matters pertaining to corporate governance, restructuring, bidding procedure, takeover offerings, capital markets, regulatory hearings, general corporate advisory and litigation.

He is the recipient of National Law Day Award from the president of India for his unique contribution to the field of corporate law. He is the chairman of CII national committee on legal services and the associate president of Society of Indian Law Firms (SILF).

Biography: Mergers and Acquisitions

Mr Shardul S Shroff is the managing partner of Amarchand & Mangaldas & Suresh A Shroff & Co. As a corporate attorney for 30 years, Mr Shroff has extensive experience in both public and private mergers and acquisitions, with significant exposure in strategic alliances and takeovers. His practice includes a broad and varied representation of domestic and transnational public and private corporations in a variety of industries, in connection with mergers and acquisitions, divestments, spin-offs, joint ventures and financing transactions. He also has extensive experience in infrastructure, projects and project finance and corporate governance issues.

During his career, Mr Shroff has been involved in many complex and high profile transactions. He has also led the firm in intricate cross-border transactions involving multiple jurisdictions around the world. Some of the key deals he advised on recently include - JSW Steel Limited in the strategic investment by JFE Corporation of approximately US$1 billion and the foreign technical collaboration between JSW Steel Limited and JFE Steel Corporation. The transaction involved various regulatory challenges including in connection with the Takeover Code. He also advised Aircel Limited in the sale of its passive infrastructure business (comprising 17,500 towers across India) to a wholly owned subsidiary of GTL Infrastructure Limited for approximately US$1.4 billion, in one of the largest all-cash M&A transaction in India.

As a leading practitioner, he has served as an adviser on high profile, government committees and legislative panels. He has participated in drafting important economic legislations and company law reforms in India. Some of the committees on which he has served include the Justice VU Eradi committee for reforms in corporate insolvency; he chaired two committees constituted by the Department of Corporate Affairs ie, the committee for asset valuation and principles of disposal of corporate properties, assets and shares and the committee for review of offences and penalties under the company law. He also advised on the second Naresh Chandra committee appointed to look into small and medium enterprises and simplification of company law (LLPs and joint ventures). He was also a member of the JJ Irani committee for amending the companies act 2006 and two SEBI appointed Bhagwati committees (1996 to 1997 and 2000) for redrafting and making modifications to the SEBI takeover code.

Because of his expertise, Mr Shroff has been consistently rated as a leading lawyer by several international fora and publications, including Who's Who Legal, AsiaLaw, Chambers Global, Euromoney and International Financial Law Review. He has also received the National Law Day Award from the president of India in November 2009 for his unique contribution to the field of corporate law. He is the chairman of CII national committee on legal services and associate president of Society of Indian Law Firms (SILF).

Mr Shroff joined Amarchand Mangaldas in 1980 and was made a partner in 1994. He attended Sydenham College, Mumbai, and the Government Law College, Mumbai University, where he received his LLB with honours.

Other Practice Areas

Shardul S Shroff also features in the following practice areas:

• Public Procurement
• Oil and Gas
• Project Finance