Must-see TV in India: corporate lawyers talking about corpor

Lawyers have long provided fodder for successful TV dramas — from Perry Mason to The Good Wife to the never-ending Law & Order franchise. But TV shows featuring real lawyers haven’t fared as well. While juicy headlines like Goldman Sachs Accused of Fraud and Wall Street Goes on Trial generate popular interest outside the legal and financial sectors, it’s fairly safe to say that, absent such a sensational bit of news, the average couch potato isn’t looking for lawyerly insights into securities regulation when they flip on the TV after a long day of work (or looking for work).

Or at least not the average American couch potato. According to The American Lawyer, a TV show featuring corporate lawyers talking about corporate law “is all the rage” in India. The two-year old series, The Firm: Corporate Law in India, is apparently “the top-rated new program in its time slot.” Notes reporter Anthony Lin, “We’re not aware of another television show of its kind: a half-hour news-and-discussion program where corporate lawyers talk about the technical details of their work.” Neither are we. The show’s host, Menaka Doshi, attributes its success “to the relative newness of India’s participation in the global deal economy.”

With topics ranging from such heart-racers as whether unit linked insurance plans (ULIPs) are securities and who should regulate them to M&A financing trends, the show sometimes invites US and UK attorneys, like Slaughter and May Senior Partner Chris Saul, Wachtell partner Adam Emmerich and former SEC chairman Harvey Pitt, to provide their perspectives. But, while “Western lawyers may lend a note of glamour to the show,” says Lin, “Indian lawyers are the staples.”

- posted by vera

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AP Photo/Terry Ashe