Real estate firms ramp up legal hiring as deals grow more complex

India’s real estate developers are expanding in-house legal teams to navigate everything from land acquisitions and redevelopment projects to insolvency-led transactions and new asset classes, as the sector becomes more institutionalised and deal-making grows increasingly complex.

The hiring reflects deeper changes underway in the industry's operating and deal-making environment, said experts.

Several major developers have announced new legal chiefs in the recent past. Ahmedabad-based Arvind SmartSpaces, part of the Lalbhai Group, hired Tarpit Patni, Godrej Properties’ head of legal for the Mumbai zone, to run its legal function. In turn, Godrej Properties hired Astha Punjabi, general counsel of BPTP Ltd, as legal head for the north zone.


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Hero Realty, the property arm of Sunil Kant Munjal's Hero Enterprise, brought in Sachin Sharma as chief legal advisor, while Anant Raj, the New Delhi-based listed developer, onboarded Arun Kumar from Jaypee Infratech to head its legal team. Monika Dhingra joined DLF last year as its executive vice-president, legal, from ReNew.

Companies are expecting a general counsel to act as a strategic advisor to the business, proactively mitigate risks and contribute to key business decisions, said Jyoti Bowen Nath, managing partner at executive search firm Claricent Partners.

“On the purely functional front, the role typically involved overseeing contracts, land acquisition, due diligence and managing disputes and litigation,” said Nath. “Now boards want a legal head who can sit in the room when a REIT structure or an M&A term sheet is being negotiated, not just review it afterwards,” she added.

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A recent KPMG-Ficci report, ‘Reimagining India’s Real Estate Landscape’, estimated the country’s real estate market in 2025 at $650 billion and projected it to reach $1 trillion by 2030.

Shweta Sheth, a partner at executive search firm Vahura, said promoter-led and fund-led real estate companies are taking very different but nuanced approaches as they expand their legal teams.

“Promoter-led companies are creating new roles of head of litigation, land acquisitions and others that report to group general counsel and are building leadership teams,” said Sheth. “In the case of private equity firms, as project portfolios expand across geographies and private equity investors demand stronger governance, companies are hiring specialists and deputy GC (general counsel) roles to support growth while managing increasingly complex legal and regulatory risks,” she added.

This surge in hiring is not limited to in-house legal departments; law firms are also poaching real estate sector experts from rivals.

Recently, Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas’ real estate partner Abhilash Pillai decided to join Trilegal. While AZB & Partners’ Veeral Vakharia joined Stratage Law as a partner in its real estate practice, JSA Advocates’ Farhana Merchant Malik joined Dentons Link Legal as a partner in the firm’s realty practice in Mumbai.

Sajit Suvarna, deputy managing partner at DSK Legal, said the real estate sector is becoming more organised and driven by large capital, so legal planning has now become a core part of business planning. Hence, Suvarna said that clients want lawyers with deep, industry-specific knowledge within their organisations.

“While developers/investors/funds and other similar stakeholders are building stronger internal legal teams, they still depend on specialist law firms for major deals, complex transactions and intricate disputes,” said Suvarna. “This has resulted in enlarged demand for legal services in the real estate sector, which is why we are adding more bench strength across all our offices for this practice area,” he added.