The name
The firm takes its name from samaanta — equality. The crest carries the scales of justice within a shield: fairness, protected. The motto that accompanies it, Justice Through Equality, is not a claim about outcomes. No advocate can promise those. It is a statement about how a matter is approached before the outcome is known.
Equality of preparation
A maintenance petition in a district court receives the same standard of reading, drafting and citation as an arbitration worth several crores. The stakes differ; the discipline does not. For the person bringing the maintenance petition, that case is the most consequential thing in their life, and it is treated accordingly.
Equality between the parties
In matrimonial matters the firm acts for husbands and for wives. This occasionally surprises people, and it should not. A case is assessed on its evidence and on the law that governs it. Whether the client is the petitioner or the respondent changes the argument; it does not change the standard of scrutiny applied to the facts, or the candour with which weaknesses are pointed out.
Our founder’s position on this has been consistent and public: justice cannot be tilted, whether in favour of men or in favour of women. Proceedings that are decided on procedural advantage rather than on merit fail everybody, including the party who wins.
Equality of access
A great deal of what goes wrong in Indian litigation goes wrong because the person involved did not know something they could reasonably have known: that maintenance runs from the date of application and not the date of the order; that a SARFAESI challenge must be brought within forty-five days; that an ex-parte decree can be set aside but only within a limitation period that starts running from knowledge.
That is why the Insights section of this website exists, and why it is written for the people facing these provisions rather than for other lawyers. Nothing there is a substitute for advice on your own facts, but a person who understands the shape of their problem asks better questions and makes better decisions.
What it costs us
Held seriously, this principle occasionally costs the firm work. Telling someone in the first meeting that their case is weak loses the instruction more often than it keeps it. We think that is the correct trade, and we would rather be the firm a person returns to than the firm they regret.