India Law Journal

The SAARCLAW Executive Council (EXCO), the international governing body of SAARCLAW (South Asian Association For Regional Co-operation in Law) on 7th January 2011 unprecedentedly elected its Vice President Hemant Batra, Corporate / FDI Lawyer as the new Secretary General (SG) of SAARCLAW. He has been the incumbent Vice President of SAARCLAW since 2007 & his name was proposed by Pakistan and seconded by Bhutan/India. He takes over from the current incumbent SG Ms. Tania Amir ul Islam, a renowned Barrister and Constitutional Expert from Bangladesh

Highlights

As Secretary General he will formulate new strategies for the members of the legal community to establish an association within and outside the SAARC region.

He will strengthen the activities of SAARCLAW by organising regular international conferences

He will extend the association of SAARCLAW with United Nations on Legal & Para-legal issues.

Review the possibility to associate Afghanistan with SAARCLAW.

Hemant Batra the Chairperson of Käden Boriss Legal, a renowned Corporate/Commercial law firm is a connoisseur of international Business Law in FDI, Cross Border Investment Policy & Procedures, Commercial and Transactional Law, Corporate Law including Corporate Management, Corporate Good Governance & Compliances, Corporate Restructuring, Due Diligence, Mergers, Acquisitions, Takeovers, Real Estate Acquisitions & Regularization Consulting and Documentation; he also has expertise in the matters pertaining to Anti-Corruption/Anti-Bribery compliances and enforcement in context of FCPA and related provisions in India and Legal Auditing. He is also - Chairperson of a project IICLAM floated by the National University of Singapore (NUS), Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC) and National law University of Delhi (NLU); and Advisory Board member of Organization of International Peace, USA.

Hemant Batra shall soon be signing a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the United Nations for undertaking diverse projects of social importance in the SAARC.

SAARCLAW assists the SAARC countries in inducting newer laws in the face of an ever-changing society as well as helping the member nations to amend their obsolete laws. It is an association of the legal communities of the SAARC countries comprising Judges, Lawyers, Academicians, Law Teachers, Public Officers and a host of other law-related persons, duly registered with the SAARC Secretariat at Kathmandu and has been given the status of a Regional Apex Body of SAARC.

SAARCLAW was established in Colombo on 24th October 1991. In these seventeen years, affiliate Country Chapters have been established in Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and also in the Republic of Maldives.

In its seventeen years of journey, the members of SAARCLAW have persistently worked towards the achievement of its objectives of bringing together the legal communities within the region for closer co-operation, development of indulgence, encouragement of exchange of ideas and spreading of information, and to use and develop law as a source and an instrument towards social change for development as well as for building co-operation among the peoples of the region.

The EXCO of SAARCLAW also elected Hon’ble Mr. Justice L. Sonam Tobgye, Chief Justice of Bhutan as its President; further, other elected included Justice Umesh C Banerjee former judge of Supreme Court & former CJ of Andhra Pradesh, Dr Abhishek M Singhvi, MP, Mr K. K. Venugopal, Constitutional Expert, Justice P. N. Bhagwati, former Chief Justice of India (India), Justice Nasim Hassan Shah, former Chief Justice of Pakistan, Mr. Mehmood Mandviwala, Justice Rasheed Rizvi, Justice Fakhruddin Ebrahim and Prof Habib-ur-Rahman (Pakistan); Mr. Amir-ul-Islam, Ms. Tani Amir, Mr. Mesbhauddin, Mr. Abdul Majumdar and Mr. M.H. Hafizullah (Bangladesh); Justice Tshering Wangchuk, Ms. Peldon Wangmo, Judge Tashi Dorji and Judge RG Norbu (Bhutan); Justice Kalyan Shreshta, sitting judge of Supreme Court, Prof Kanak Bikram Thapa and Purnaman Shakya (Nepal); Ms. Dhara Wijeyatilake, Mr. Nihal Jayamane, Mr. Rohan Sahabandhu and Manohara de Silva (Sri Lanka).

Hemant Batra originally hails from Haryana & has graduated in law from the Punjab University, Chandigarh. He has written, edited and published many publications like “Doing Business in India”, “SAARC (Text Book)”, “SAARCLAW (Newsletters)”, “Doing Business With Destination – India”, “Doing Business With Asian Tiger – India”, “Foreign Direct Investment Policy Of India – How Direct & How Real”, “Regional Trade Agreements As Against Multilateral Agreements”, “Regional Trade Blocks As Against WTO”. He is a visiting Guest Speaker to the Griffith University, Brisbane, National Law School, Hyderabad, National Law University, Delhi, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Corporate Affairs and American Bankruptcy Institute, New York. He has spoken at more than 100 international events. He has been associated with various literary projects undertaken by Nova Southeastern University, USA and Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, Germany. He has travelled extensively around the world on legal missions, more particularly he has frequented USA, UK, Germany, France, Denmark, Holland, Russia, Dubai, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Nepal, Myanmar, Maldives, Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Australia, Switzerland, Hong Kong, China, Indonesia, Austria, Finland and South Korea.