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Neha Sachde’s legal experience spans over a period of 15 years. She has significant experience, in handling commercial transactions including mergers and acquisitions, restructuring, shareholder agreements, construction claims, PPP agreements, drafting dispositions for arbitration cases to reviewing offer documents and drafting advises for clients.
She also poses as a Contract Manager for top tier clients, by providing timely and strategic advice in the clients’ best interest to manage potential risk exposure.
Neha is a part of the Bar Association of Maharashtra and Goa and has attained a dual certification by qualifying under the Solicitors Regulatory Authority of England and Wales.
Interview
Host: What motivated you to choose the Legal sector as a domain of work and how has been your career span?
Neha: Being a Lawyer and then a Solicitor has always been a little girls dream in me. I have always been a very close observer of people, their dialogue and attitude that they carry, and what inspired me to be a lawyer, were the lawyers whom I used to frequently see and knew that is the most respected, humbled profession and lawyers have an outstanding knowledge and standout in society. These qualities of lawyers inspired me to be one.
Nonetheless, my career span from a trainee lawyer until Head of Legal today, has not been easy. There were lot of challenges at professional and personal level, that I had to deal with … however, the said journey was only possible due to constant nurturing of, determination, positivity and belief that I will attain what I want to attain.
Host: Tell us about a complex legal issue you worked on. Describe the complexity and tell us how you approached it?
Neha: Well post pandemic, the parties are extremely persevering on each and every term of an agreement that they are negotiating on. The intention of the parties is to pierce beyond force majeure events and wishes to negotiate terms that would suit itself in every circumstance. For example, in a long-time franchise agreement where a franchisee invests millions, the expectation from the other party is, they wish to have flexibility to terminate the agreement based on the smallest default and should be considered as material breach. They also wish to have control over each and every aspect of business. The parties are not willing to take slightest commercial risk, against the investments made and wants to ensure financial stability and no reputational damage in any circumstance.
Accordingly, we are negotiating contracts to the safest possible clause that suits each party, which may not be always possible. The clauses which are unable to be negotiated to suit the best possible scenario has to be backed with various types of insurances. We are also reviewing the existing long-term agreements to ensure all risks are covered and to determine whether business interruption insurances are available and are in place.
Host: The pandemic saw some courts begin moving towards more remote proceedings and availability. Is this sustainable, and a possible way to increase access to justice, in your opinion?
Neha: In my opinion digitalization in the judiciary, was very much required and is certainly sustainable. The human mindset has only adopted this post pandemic where the need to adapt to these new available tools was very much need of an hour. Digitalization in judiciary is very useful as it helps to clear backlog of cases in the judiciary system due to strict deadlines required to be adhered too! when the case is administered digitally, it not only speeds up the process, but it is also efficient and is a best example of adaptation to the new digital era. Where the entire globe is moving on digital platforms for each and every necessity, to not have digitalization in judiciary would rather be typical and would be like to adhere to the rules of old school where the same could be more productive digitally and in the best interest of the parties.
Host: Key lessons or experiences that have enriched you and are currently aiding you in your work profile.
Neha: No matter which party you are representing in, whether it may be a contractual transaction or representing in a dispute resolution matter, two things are most important:
Never believe literally in what your client says as, what he/she explains can be his perceptive but not the facts, facts would be only determined after reviewing the documents, which can present a completely different story, and which can completely further change the aspect of a transaction or a matter in dispute.
It is important to record each and everything in writing as you never know what can turn back to you. So, it is important to have a Red Flags report if in a transaction and also advice to clients should always be recorded in a written form.
This is what I have learned from my experience, and I always ensure to do it.
Host: Time is money in any profession and in legal it's most of all. How do you ensure to make the best of your time as a lawyer?
Neha: Time is more than money. If the clock stops there is nothing that one can do. As a good lawyer, I ensure that I do justice to a matter with appropriate time. If a matter requires 10 hours of my time, I cannot complete that in an hour and at the same time, if a matter only requires 30 minutes, I cannot appropriate my 3 hours of time. I need to ensure that adequate time is assigned for each matter, not more and not less; and money will follow accordingly. What is most important is to invest the required time towards a matter, to do justice to the concerned matter.
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