Posted on 03/16/2005 6:23:13 AM PST by CarrotAndStick
Legal outsourcing to India seems to be fast catching up in the US, with large number of attorneys in Grand Forks increasingly relying on lawyers, sitting thousands of miles away, in cities like Bangalore, Delhi and Chennai, drafting legal briefs and doing research for cases to be fought in American courts.
Given the advantage the Indian lawyers have, experts in Grand Forks believe it is unlikely that other Asian or African countries would compete in this sector as has been in case of call centres.
"This is because Indian lawyers are uniquely positioned to assist the US legal market," claimed Rocky Dhir, who was among the first few to recognise India's potential in legal outsourcing.
Encouraged by the positive response from his clients in the US, Dhir is right now flying to Bangalore and Chennai to recruit a fresh batch of advocates to help his company, Atlas Legal Research, fight cases in American courts. He is not the only one to do so; several US law firms have been visiting various Indian cities to hire lawyers.
"There is no difference between Indian and American advocates. The quality of work is the same," said Attorney-at-Law, Jay Ethington, specialising in criminal defence.
A former Assistant United States Attorney, Ethington said he had tried Indian advocates to do research and complete the paper work for about half-a-dozen cases. "Results have been very good all the time," he told HindustanTimes.com.
Indian advocates do not fight the case directly in US courts. Sitting thousands of miles away, they do the research work, analyse the case and draft the legal brief for advocates, who fight the case in US courts. This saves lot of time and energy, besides money, for American attorneys.
Now a strong advocate of legal outsourcing, because the advantages India have, Ethington said: "I am very much impressed by the work done by Indian lawyers to help fight cases in US courts." Initially, like other US advocates, he too was reluctant in hiring Indian lawyers to do research work for his court cases.
Highly impressed by the quality of work executed by Indian lawyers, Larry Newman, who specialises in corporate transaction, said: "They have been instrumental in getting favourable results even in complex cases." Author of Texas Corporation Law, Newman said he favoured legal outsourcing to India because of cost efficiency, fast response and good quality of work done by the advocates. This is the reason, why it is fast catching up, he argued.
Spelling out the advantage, Rocky Dhir told HindustanTimes.com before leaving for Bangalore and Chennai on Tuesday (March 15): "India, like the US, has a common law jurisdiction." The fact that the entire legal system, from studies to debate to court orders, is conducted in English has come as a great advantage.
Referring to his fast increasing list of clients, Dhir said that was primarily because of the "fractional cost" at which they do the service compared to those done by the advocates in the US. Dhir, who recruits legal research associate from prestigious colleges in India, said salaries for top law graduate were one-tenth of the US counterpart.
One of the greatest advantage, he said, was the time difference between India and the US. "While our legal research associate are busy preparing the case, our rivals - US lawyers, sleep. As such our company works 24 hours," Dhir said.
Experts here believe that legal outsourcing would be instrumental in bringing down the cost of court cases considerably. It would also be an added advantage for large number of Indian companies - Infosys, Tata, Wipro -- who have business in the US. "With the help of lawyers from India, these companies can very well compete with their rivals in courts here and that too at a fractional cost."
Maybe we can strat looking to outsource our congresscritters!
Mark
Jeepers Creepers!
Makes you wonder what the point was in developing a high order civilization. It's now being destroyed and/or stolen, so we can all inherit a pile of third world crap in it's stead.
It takes light years to finish off a case in an Indian court.No wonder Indian lawyers have plenty of time on their hand & can deeply study an case!!
Huh?
This is actually good for American lawyers - litigation, like most things, is demand elastic. As the price for litigation goes up, demand drops because the expected return drops. As the price for litigation drops, more people will be willing to bring more lawsuits because their expected return will be higher. The only limiting factor is a lack of supply - courts & arbitrators are already too busy to increase output significantly.
Within a few years, the dream of every American trial lawyer will finally be realized: The American economy will have ground to a halt, everyone will have sued everyone, and the trial lawyers will have emigrated to India where they will be safe from torch-bearing mobs.
This may be a good thing. If we manage to put most of our legal beagles out of business, and saddle India with millions of worthless lawyers, we might even become competitive again.
It couldn't happen to a more appropriate "profession".
If you can't hang 'em, outsource 'em!
As it is, this is likely to make the bottom lines even fatter at the law offices, and encourage even more useless litigation. I am willing to bet that among the next steps for this outsourcing will be drafting legislation.
I think that legal activity should be subtracted from our GDP computations.
I second your 'HUH?'
Very smart move on many levels.
Baaaaahhh,You've spoilt all my fun.
India has countless out of work lawyers.It would be safe to assume that the ones who get outsourced work are such lawyers.
Now, THAT is what I call education. Thanks, I too missed the error.
Because of lower wages?
Because of the lower wages?
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