About

Now an award-winning specialist in M&A, joint venture agreements, project equity and infrastructure deals, Vidyut Gulati’s legal career began in 2002 at DUA Associates, and continued after a move to Amarchand & Mangaldas & Suresh A Shroff & Co in 2006. Before moving in-house, Gulati gained expertise in structuring complex acquisition and investment transactions, multi-party negotiations and leading transactions involving public and private companies as well as government undertakings. In 2015, three years after becoming a partner at the firm, Gulati moved to Cairn India, one of the country’s largest independent oil and gas exploration and production companies, to take up the role of general counsel. In a short space of time she has already introduced and implemented standard operating processes and systems in the legal team with the aim of institutionalising them as a part of the team’s culture. At a turbulent time in the energy sector due to oil price fluctuation, Gulati aligns the legal team of eight with the key objectives of the company, fostering a culture of thinking and innovative execution in the process. As part of this Gulati says ‘the recent levels of prices, with the current burden that we have, puts the company’s profitability under significant stress. We had to innovate and reinvent our approach in many ways: effective cost and manpower management combined with industry-wide advocacy measures helped us face the challenge. We had to maximise our potential by efficient resource utilisation and management’. Reflecting the level of trust in both her legal and management expertise, Gulati works closely with Cairn India’s CEO, CFO and business unit heads, and is part of the core management team and leadership team. She says, ‘being able to influence senior management and the board is critical. Engaging with senior management and providing timely legal advice, is fundamental to the general counsel role’.