Adv. Nidhi Singh elaborates on meticulous effort, rationale approach and innovation needed for legal excellence

1. After securing Rank 1 both in undergraduate course at KIIT School of Law, Bhubaneswar and diploma in Competition Policy and Law in National Law University, Delhi, you went on to pursue several courses at Universitat de Barcelona, King’s College London, University of Oxford, Harvard Kennedy School and Stanford Law School. How have the various experiences shaped your competence and knowledge base?

The legal education that I have gained thus far from any of the universities abroad has given me a broad and deep-seated understanding of law and the legal system across the world. It has helped me appreciate the diverse perspectives of legal culture prevalent in all continents. I educated myself with my particular area of interest in law that drove me to work harder and made me feel connected to my work every day. With every milestone that I completed in legal education and work experience, I have felt and experienced my knowledge base to be expanding and conceptually getting better and stronger. In terms of competence, being blessed and fortunate enough to study at some of the best law schools, has sharpened my ability to present my thoughts, legal principles and relevant analysis with improved articulation and clarity.

2. Was there a special advantage that you decided to pursue higher education abroad? How did you learn about the different scholarship programs?

There were two primary reasons that I wanted to study abroad and that goes in the order of being listed here: (a) I had always read that some of the great works in the legal field were done in these universities abroad and I wanted to experience this difference when you study with some of the best minds of the world. By doing so, I wanted to come out of my comfort zone and learn how these people if not think differently, then at least perform more efficiently; (b) secondly, as a child, I aimed to study science in Class XI and XII and eventually clear IITs, but I ended up doing law as an unplanned path, but once I entered this field that I could not imagine performing at mediocre level, hence I raised my own bar with every passing month and year.

I learned about the various scholarships programs by doing my own thorough research of the information available on the websites of the universities that I aimed at while applying. Thereafter I narrowed down my research on scholarship with my area of interest in law and the funding available with the university for that particular area of legal studies.

3. Kindly share your motivation to take numerous steps to inform the general public about legal issues?

There are few initiatives to which I never say a “No” to: (a) giving guest lectures at any law school across India and abroad; (b) helping students identify issues to write legal research papers on; (c) doing pro bono cases in Delhi and Jharkhand; (d) currently doing pro bono cases for San Francisco and Washington DC policing and housing related issues in Palo Alto, California; (e) writing legal opinions for newspapers, blogs, journals, etc.; (f) participating in panel discussions; and (g) giving time to students who appear for international moot court competitions in King’s College, London.

4. You have held a variety of positions over the years. Which one has been the most fulfilling for you and which one has been the most arduous, and why?

The most fulfilling position has been while working as Faculty Teaching Associate at Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration, Mussoorie. Primarily, because this job gave me everything beyond a good salary and living i.e. good seniors/bosses to work with, good colleagues, intellectual environment to perform and immense learning opportunity. The most arduous work has been working as practicing lawyer with the Delhi High Court and Supreme Court of India where one is required to be on toes 24*7 and probably also put in many late nights into drafting and preparing briefs for the next day.

5. It is a common belief that litigation poses many difficulties. What were your initial stage hurdles, and how did you overcome them?

Litigation is initially arduous but becomes fulfilling once it becomes financially rewarding. At the initial stages, you are required to do a lot of clerical work which actually helps you learn everything about this profession. It is intimidating when you make your first appearance before the Judge and the Judge asks you a number of questions. So, like a sincere student, you have to prepare your case really well to not make a mockery of yourself in the court. Secondly, working with a smart and hard taskmaster senior in litigation can make you mentally strong and flexible. You will learn to prepare a brief/do quick legal research within a few hours and be prepared for a presentation/discussion. I do not think I have still overcome all the hurdles, therefore, my way of dealing with things is that I try to be consistent and disciplined with my work. The best strategy is not to pile up work for tomorrow and meet all deadlines. This actually makes you an efficient, hard and smart worker.

6. Can you shed some light on financial jurisprudence and the importance of its awareness in practical life?

As a lawyer and probably even as a common man, one must know how the financial markets (money or capital markets) essentially work. This is because one must learn to make money even while sleeping. If you plan to build all your wealth by continuously working, then probably it is both impractical and inefficient. The fact is that one day, you are going to get old and you might not have the same strength and stamina. Therefore, using legal education as an advantage to learn the basics of financial economics, corporate finance, business transactions, securities regulation, venture capital can put you a step ahead in your career, help you avoid the unnecessary stress of lack of adequate or desirable standard of living and learn the art of wealth management.

7. You have enthusiastically worked on competition concerns in artificial intelligence. What opportunities does this arena offer for legal practitioners?

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a relatively new domain for India but definitely not for an advanced country like the United States of America. It presents a greater number of opportunities with AI focus in antitrust in European and American countries, less in India. The kind of work that India offers at this point is quite preliminary and not that detailed which does not allow you to expand your domain in legal research and practice in this field. One of the major problems here is that the legal market in India does not allow entry of foreign lawyers, which restricts the kind of exposure one could possibly get. AI and antitrust has opened a number of debates on empirical evidence for online collusion and the role of algorithms, abuse of dominance by the big tech companies and the availability of pricing data to track these changes. All of this has a lot of space for legal thinking and innovation.

8. What do you consider to be the major challenge in the legal profession? Would you kindly share any challenges you may have encountered at the beginning of your career and how you overcame them?

I think one needs to be mentally agile if you want to be a good lawyer and to be known in your field. Apart from the God-gifted talent, the crucial thing is to be able to willingly clock in hours of hard work and still not complain about the workload. The profession will throw you with different types of challenges at different stages, be it as a student, a practitioner, a scholar, a writer or an academician (therefore I am not going to list to any one) but despite all the challenges if you are mentally strong, brave and determined to not let your thoughts and goals get disturbed because of externalities, the world is yours. You can probably conquer all your fears with just this mindset. Rain or shine, keep going – that is the only secret to way out to all kinds of difficulties.

9. How important has been legal research in your journey so far? Can you share your preferred research methodology?

For a lawyer, be it academics or in practice: legal research is the most important skill to develop and one must continue to do so all her life. The reason for this is: law is a dynamic profession. One must be adept with the legal changes in the market and regulatory developments. As a practicing lawyer, I like to perform quick legal research using the standard legal database but with the evolution of technology and my added skills, I like to add more empirical research methodology to my work. I prefer to also apply statistical inference in law and economic analysis of law to my legal research to make it practically more relevant.

10. Do you have any final advice for the law students that look up to you and find you to be a tremendous inspiration?

Almost 10 years after graduation, I know one thing with certainty that law is a very demanding profession if taken seriously and sincerely. To do well in this profession, you probably have to work every day to be at the top of the game in your own worth. It is a profession that requires being meticulous, probably even to an annoying level of attention to detail, performing in a time-bound manner and going back and forth with legal principles and right application. So, one must be both mentally and physically prepared to deal with this kind of work for a long time in a career with the right attitude.

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