Highlights
- The 2nd Edition Economic Times Global Legal Convention and Awards 2025 commenced in Four Seasons, Mumbai, uniting legal professionals and policymakers to celebrate excellence and innovation in the legal industry.
- Ashwani Bhatia, Whole Time Member of the Securities and Exchange Board of India, delivered a keynote address focusing on the importance of quasi-judicial orders in safeguarding investor interests, highlighting that 92% of appeals against SEBI’s orders were upheld in the previous year.
- The event featured panel discussions on various topics, including the future of the Indian legal landscape by 2030 and the impact of artificial intelligence on legal operations and dispute resolution.
The first day of the 2nd Edition Economic Times Global Legal Convention and Awards 2025, a premier event celebrating excellence, innovation, and leadership in the legal industry, was held in Four Seasons, Mumbai. The event aimed to bring together legal professionals, thought leaders, and policymakers from around the globe.
The event began with the Welcome Address by the Summit Chairperson, Amritha Salian, General Counsel, Chiratae Ventures, for the first day of the two-day congregation of lawyers, general counsels and managing partners.
Ashwani Bhatia, Whole Time Member of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), delivered the keynote address. He discussed on SEBI’s enforcement mechanisms and the critical role of quasi-judicial orders in protecting investor interests and confidence in the capital markets.
Reflecting on his four-decade-long career that began in 1985, Bhatia shared his unique journey from a career banker to a key figure in India’s financial regulatory ecosystem. “I started as a banker, served in the banking industry for 37 years, and for the past three years, I have been a regulator. It’s been an interesting journey where protecting investors through quasi-judicial orders has become one of the most meaningful aspects of my work,” he said.
The Whole Time Member in his keynote underscored SEBI’s enforcement performance, revealing that the regulator issued approximately 1,400 quasi-judicial orders in the financial year 2024. Notably, around 92% of appeals against SEBI’s orders before the Securities Appellate Tribunal (SAT) and approximately 77% of appeals before the Supreme Court were upheld.
The first day was concluded with, “The BIG Interview” with Ashish Shelar, Minister for Information Technology of Maharashtra. The key takeaways included the Government of Maharashtra re-visiting their IT Policy, 2025 to be in alignment with contemporary development and innovation, proposed framework and objective for the AI Policy, 2025 in the line with the aims and objectives of Maha Hub Innovation Centre, and initiatives to incentivise and support startups in their research and development programme.
The panel discussions were held on the wide array of topics such as: Discussion and deliberation on the Indian legal outlook for 2030; Means and methods for navigating M&A trends in the contemporary events around economic uncertainty and geo-political instability; Under the global ripple effect in the context of cross-border white-collar crime and Indias’s legal response; Insightful discussion on how intelligent automation is reshaping research, analysis and drafting.
The panel also came together to address the ways for attaining effectiveness in resolving commercial disputes. There were discussions regarding automation of legal operations through deployment of artificial intelligence, and incorporation of ESG into corporate strategy.
The panel also addressed the legal framework going through reforms amid technology innovation.
In conjunction with the convention on the second day of the convention, the Global Legal Awards 2025 will recognize outstanding contributions across various sectors of the legal field. Categories span from Law Firm of the Year to Innovative Legal Technology Solutions, aiming to honor those who have demonstrated exceptional performance and innovation.
The Presenting partner is Lexlegis.ai; the gold partner is Zoho Sign; Silver Partner is Kroll, Spotdraft, and ThinkLaw advocate; Associate partners are IndusLaw and My-Contracts; and Supporting Partners are ANB Legal, Cubictree, Circle of Counsels, DGS Associates, Lakshmikumaran Sridharan attorney, Legistify, ProVakil, Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas and Verist Law.
