The SpicyIP Podcast SS Edn: Ep 02 with Mr. Sandeep Rathod
Sonisha Srinivasan
In this 2nd episode of the SpicyIP Podcast Summer School Edition, I got an opportunity to have a conversation with Mr. Sandeep Rathod, a charismatic legal expert and long time commentator and friend of the blog! I was so inspired to see the amount of enthusiasm and energy he had even late at night, when we did this shoot after a long day of classes. During the Summer School, Sandeep sir gave us a plethora of insights including perspectives from the generic pharma side, his experiences with post and pre grant oppositions, role of different stakeholders in issues of access, as well as general tips for all of us to navigate our journeys and much more. I am sure his narrations and anecdotes will stick with us in the years to come. It was a pleasure to hear his thoughts on navigating life, law school and thriving as an in-house counsel. It does hit the right chord, in a world full of chaos, when he talks about “Tehraav”(patience) and that “You need to be still water for a long time!”. I also particularly enjoyed his discussion on dealing with FOMO in law school! Here is the episode, watch on to find out more! (You can view episode 01 with Mr Murali Neelakantan here)
SpicyIP TV: The Summer School Edition – Episode 02 Sandeep Rathod on A Career in Law, and Legal Education
In this episode (02), Sonisha Srinivasan speaks to Mr Sandeep Rathod (bio below) about his thoughts on how to navigate law school and build a successful legal career, drawing from his experience in the pharma industry. He starts with discussing what it takes to thrive as an in-house counsel, the importance of practical writing skills, the shortcomings of present legal education system in India and how to overcome that. He also reflects on how to deal with FOMO and find purpose amidst the evolving landscape of legal education.
About Sandeep Rathod: Sandeep Rathod serves as the Global General Counsel at Piramal Pharma Limited, bringing extensive expertise from the pharmaceutical industry. He graduated from Government Law College, Mumbai in 2002 and holds an LLM from Pittsburgh School of Law and another from Mumbai University. He has held key roles as General Counsel and IP Head at leading pharmaceutical companies, including J.B. Chemicals and Pharmaceuticals Limited, Sebamed India, Mylan Laboratories, and Cadila Healthcare, among others. He has previously taught intellectual property law at NALSAR University of Law, Gujarat National Law University, NMIMS, and the Institute of Law, Nirma University as a visiting faculty. He is a recognised expert in pharmaceutical and regulatory FMCG legislation, patents, and in-bound product/technology licensing, and is a regular commentator on patent office decisions.
SS: We have a couple of questions for you sir.
SR: Shoot.
SS: So, being an in-house legal counsel, what advice would you have for students who want to get into in-house pharma and also if you could bring about what kind of work you do being in in-house pharma and also the difference between how it is to work at a law firm and in-house Pharma?
SR:So, let me take the easiest question first. I haven’t worked in a law firm as a lawyer. I have given work as a client to them but I haven’t worked as an in-house lawyer except for a very short duration as a intern and at that time it was a different era, a different time. So, maybe I cannot answer the third question so I have taken it the first.
Coming to the first question then, how do students prepare for a career in in-house? Law department, not just only pharma. I think what students need to work on is whether it is a three-year law student or a five-year law student, in-house does not necessarily need some of the skills that law school students spend a lot of time on and this is with no taking the shine away from stuff like mooting for example. I would say that if you are looking at a career in in-house,one of the skills to develop would be to write and let me clarify what I mean by to write. I am not looking at you able to write a 15 page paper on a particular topic which has no substance. The in-house counsel’s life is about reducing the complexity of questions that the management asks into the simplest possible tasks and answering it in the least number of words without taking substance away. So, one key skill that I would want a law graduate to develop before entering an in-house legal department is how to write well with the least amount of words, not a 15 page mini dissertation, so that’s one skill I would want.
The other skill which I think none of the law schools prepare for and which probably even internships do not prepare adequately for is working in enough in-house legal teams during your internship stage and not a three week or a two week stint but a proper two month three month stint. So that gives you an idea of what is the day-to-day work that the in-house legal team does and whether it suits your temperament or not and also critically what is the fire fighting that a legal team in-house does on a daily basis. An intern, while looking at the law firm life understands what a litigating law firm’s life, lawyer’s life is or what a partner’s life is at least if not a partner, a senior associate’s life is in the advisory space- you draft an opinion, you re- read the opinion, it goes through two revisions but students wanting to come into in-house life. How many times have they done an internship which is of meaningful period with an in-house team and I have to take some share of the blame here as an in-house counsel that we don’t give enough long-term internship opportunities and we as in the entire in-house fraternity, not me alone. But I think we need to be open to the idea that we will have to train future in-house. lawyers in-house first rather than always relying on a law firm trained lawyer who’s coming to in-house after three, four, eight, twelve years of experience at various stages to come to the in-house side. So I think it’ll have to be a bit of change of perspective and honest efforts by the students and honest efforts by the company lawyers also.
I forgot the second question which you had sandwiched in between.
SS:I was asking about the difference between how it is to work in in-house…
SR: Which I told you, it was the third question
SS: And also how what kind of work is done?
SR: So see, the fun part of being in in-house counsel is every morning when you come to office you believe that you will do three tasks before you exit and I can guarantee you in the last few years at least I have never exited office having completed all the three tasks. The life of an in-house counsel across industries is 70-80% fire fighting, 15% strategic thinking and 10% on departmental admin issues. I am talking of a lawyer at my level, as in you know, where you have some people reporting to you and you report to the management. It will be slightly different for people at the start of the career but fire fighting becomes and continues to remain of a very big part of your life in Indian in-house pharma teams and also in Indian other legal teams not just pharma teams because what happens is you reach office the marketing head will call you that we’ve got this notice or the distribution head will call you and say we need the distribution agreement between. You had not penciled that in your day-to-day work for that week’s diary but these are the people who bring business to the company. So you have to then let go of your planned action item that this is when I want to think of a particular question that I was asked last week and I have to prepare a proper memo for. So the in-house counsel’s life, whether pharma or other sectors because I have friends from other sectors majorly is about daily doing a lot of fire fighting while being able to successfully deliver on the strategic thinking bits also. So that is the only way I would put it without sharing more secrets and not letting people think of coming to in-house legal teams.
SS: You mentioned about strategic thinking. Connected to it, in your sessions at the SpicyIP Summer School, a lot of things that you said made the students and all of us think a lot more than what we just learn usually in law schools. So in that respect how do you think, what do you think about interdisciplinary studying and in respect of having the knowledge of business and other aspects outside of law which would help the student in a better way when they come out of law school?
SR: So I will start with certain caveats. I am a three-year law graduate. I am not very close to people, my age who’ve done five years because of that time five years was less rampant and less available. There were very few law schools in the early 2000s where you could do a five-year law course. But I think that for strategic thinking, I believe that the five-year law program as it is done today in the country is not the right fit. And I have absolutely not mincing any words on it. Trying to reduce this further for example, the two main programs that is the BA LLB program and how the five year equally BBA LLB program.
Let’s take the later introduced and in my eyes what could have been done better the BBA LLB program. I haven’t seen most proper so-called five-year law schools have good accounts or costing or tax teachers during the first three-year part when the students are supposed to be learning the BBA subjects. So then in my eyes it is a hoodwinking of the students and the hoodwinking of the future employers whether it is the law firm side or the in-house side. When a law school claims that I have trained these people for five years on a mix of commerce, subjects and mix of law subjects and they understand the basics of accountancy. I’m being very frank here. I haven’t seen enough law school BBA LLB graduates who can if not balance the balance sheet as we B.com graduates call it but at least reach the balance sheet from the original trial balance to trading and profit & loss account to reaching the balance sheet. So I think that that that structure has failed while the law schools may not want to admit it has failed. The current crop of BBA LB students that come to us during internship or asking for a full-time role, they are not able to give us the value of a proper three-year B.com and then a three-year LLB graduate. You could also take it with my declared conflict of interest that I am a proper three-year bcom. graduate and then a proper three-year LLB graduate. So I have to declare that conflict.
I’ll also say the same thing for people who have done the BA LLB program and this is limited to the people I have met in the last few years, younger students I would say. The advent of more easily available, recyclable material on Google and now in Chat GPT has reduced the sharpness of students to write, what was expected of Humanities students, the ability to think differently. So it was expected that a 5-year BBA LLB graduate would be able to empathize more with the question of law, questions of jurisprudence and craft an argument and then learn the legal subjects in the third or fourth or fifth year and become a better lawyer. As I mentioned about the BBA LB program, I have the same views on the BA LLB program for a very large margin of students, it has not served the purpose. Again, repeating my conflict of interest, it you could call it in simplest term, sour grapes or whatever, but I don’t think that the students are getting the right foundation in a majority of law programs for a majority of the students. You could argue that one student from a particular law college has been able to crack the Rhodes etc, if we look at Rhodes cracking as a measure of success or one student in 800 BBA LB graduates from three different universities is able to actually do a balance sheet balance. I don’t think that can be the measure of success.
The measure of a BBA LLB lawyer should be if he comes on day one also to a normal Section 138 discussion with the business team and the legal head is he understanding what happened. But okay, products were sold an invoice was raised and invoice then how does it impact the sales of the company in the terms of books of accounts? What does it mean when a account goes into bad debts? Because the lawyer is only thinking from the post cheque bouncing stage. The business team has come to the legal team today or cheque has bounced. I have to draft the in-house notice for the 138. But the BBA LLB programs have at least very honestly not taught them how to look at before hand what it means of what is the impact in the books of accounts and in the tax record for a cheque bouncing. Let’s take the reverse.If in a second year or third year situation when you get money back from a bad debt account, how do you account for it? What are the implications for it? Similarly, what is the impact of a particular entry not being allowed under tax laws? And like for example students, here would realize the MSME Act has certain requirements and payments from companies be made to MSMEs within 45 days. If not what happens. A lawyer in the in-house team should at least have the basics that okay, what does it mean? Not just the impact that okay. If you are now in violation of the MSME Act, that is the easiest thing to say. But the lawyer who’s done a five year BBA LLB program should be able to say that okay, this was not paid to an MSME enterprise and because it was not paid, what is the impact in the books of accounts, what is the book in the, impact in the tax books, that becomes an inadmissible expenditure, etc. So I believe that students are being short changed because of the way the current training is given to BBA LLB and BA LLB students.
If this training has to be sharpened further, we will need a lot more professors, a lot more detail oriented professors. So both quantity and quality will have to increase on the teaching side and also we will need students to become a lot more serious on the first three years of the five year program. This idea that I will also during these first three years go to this moot that moot, write this paper, write that paper. You ultimately have only 24 hours as a student. Most of you would be doing the BBA LLB or BA LLB programs from outside your house. This would be your first way outside your homes. Majority, if you look at the new established corporate universities, most students, there are from in that sense of hostel segments. So you have finite amount of time, you are not taking the best care of your health, but because of FOMO around you, you want to do three publications in the first semester itself after 12 standard. You want to do the top end moot courts in the second year itself of the five year course. Otherwise you think you’ve not done anything in life. I think students will have to undergo a radical rethinking and let go of FOMO. So academic coordinators will also have to radically rethink how the deliver education and how they assess. If you get people who will be able to be good at accounts in the second year of the five year program, they will also be good in house lawyers at the end of the five year program because they will understand what the head of distribution is saying when he is saying that a particular transaction has gone bad or a particular ware house has been sealed. So along the answer to a very short question, it has given me a chance to vent, but I don’t know. I believe that students need to be taught better and students need to be spending more time on the here and now rather than the CV padding of three blog articles publications in the second year itself for two moot courts of national level in the third sem itself.
SS: And I think I relate to what you’re saying because a lot of times when students enter the law school. The two years itself the pressure is built on making a very good CV and by the time the end comes about placements and things like that. So in that respect how do you think a student can undergo or take themselves through the FOMO that you said? How can they better navigate their way through FOMO and anxiety of say everyone else doing it but not me?
SR :See, so this is a societal problem. As we’ve been speaking in the last two days, at the IP school here.Law students today unfortunately have it a lot worse than we had less resources, but we also had less competition. Law students today have AI Chat GPT to write an entire project, but they also have other students who are using the same engine to write the similar paper, right? And there is because law today has become that much more expensive and students are today having more sensitivity about money because you are a hostelite. If you look at 30 years ago when they were only majorly three year programs, the probability of a person having done law outside his own town was less. There were many students who would go to from mufasil Towns district to the state capital to do, but the proportion was less. Today a very large number of as I said five year program students for example would do it in a private University or would be national law schools and which would mean that you are in a hostel setup and from day one therefore you are seeing how much you are spending, that hits you mentally, then you have super achiever seniors who have done something and then the FOMO sets in. So your question was how to let go of FOMO. I think it will have to start with us as parents and professors or academics. I don’t call myself a professor because I’m not one. I’m an adjunct teacher at times when I teach. I think we will have to first be ready to acknowledge that these people have taken the decision of law before even becoming a voter. Most people enter the five year program before they become 18. For us as parents, adjunct professors and professors to expect the entire batch of how many thousand five year students will churn out top quality essay material or top quality answers which 20 or 30 years ago would have become average BCOM or average BA graduate because they were in ten or five year programs. So we have to first reset our expectations.
Then comes the issue of expectations between students. As I said earlier I have a lot of empathy and sympathy for students today because I genuinely think they have a a tougher life. You are in a hyper competitive environment, much larger class size, too many universities in metro cities. So a city like Bangalore or Bombay will have multiple reasonably expensive and reasonably branded five year law programs. So that much competition around you. Even if you don’t want to think of a FOMO somebody on your LinkedIn group or your Instagram group or whatever WhatsApp group will say, away from that law school, he’s already going to one moot in the third sem itself. Coming again and again to that example or his article got published in some place or like SpicyIP etc.
SS: Or he won that moot.
SR: He won winning a separate winning does require a lot more efforts but that is at the end. The process of entering moots itself requires a lot more time to be taken from your day-to-day studies. You are just coming away for the first time from your family. Your food is not being taken care of as much as your parents would take care. You are not taking care of your health. Plus you are having a FOMO. So let go of FOMO. Please realize one thing. And this is a plus 40 year old telling people who are under 20. A large part of your life will happen to you. You be ready for what comes to you. Don’t try to think as an 18, 19 year old that you can control everything. It is very naive. I’m not using the word foolish. I’m using the word naive. It is very naive and maybe naivety is what gets us the mad crazy scientist and mad crazy lawyers also. But it is very naive of people to believe at 18, 19 years old that I will do this and I will change that and etc. Completely having aims, ambitions, dreams is good but getting flown in that ocean because you see everybody else doing the same surfing on that ocean wave. I don’t think that helps anybody in any profession. You’ve chosen a profession. A profession takes decades of foundational knowledge. look at surgeons. A MS surgeon will not be even a basic surgeon before age 30. You will become lawyers at age 22, 23 in the five year program. Right? The MS surgeon will after 30 also spend few years honing his skills under an expert surgeon. And only post 35 will he start becoming a well-known surgeon in that district and start making good money. Let’s also honest, money is an important criteria. Now for you five year graduates to think that by age 22 I’m going in a top tier law firm because one person in my previous batch did it. You are competing with 120 students in the class. What makes you think you will crack it and is the end of life at age 22 if you don’t get that one law firm job?
No. So start understanding that a lawyer’s career today. Just like it was 40 years. Okay, look at any of the legal stalwarts of today, people whom you respect or people who have expired in the last 20 30 years. Soli Sorabji Nani Palkhivala Whatever. You read their autobiographies or biographies. They were not necessarily the most fantastic lawyers at age 23, 24 when they did their law programs. So why do you want to crush everything into a hundred and forty-second tweet or a 30-second tiktok reel or an instagram or that matter? Life for you lawyers will be longer than for us and much longer than people who passed careers before us. So invest your time in reading, developing your reading skills, comprehension skills, analytical skills and let go of the FOMO of that if I don’t get the first tier one law firm job at age 22 then I’m done for and I’m not worth living. Let it go. A lawyer’s life should ideally start after 30 in terms of them getting professional recognition. Just like a doctor. Why do you think that a doctor should be 30 plus when you want a consultation from an expert doctor, but you want a top tier recognition of in a law firm role before 25 itself. Look at other professions, develop patience and develop a positive outlook. I think those things will work for any professional foundation.
SS: Thank you so much Sir. It was a great conversation and I think to a lot of students who are in this stage of choosing a career or choosing what comes after law. I think these words will definitely make a difference to them.
SR: See I’ll tell this. This has been very polite, but for those who have seen Munna Bhai, there’s that dialogue in Munna Bhai, Majja ni life. (life full of enjoyment) You guys have chosen law. I have just said a few minutes ago. At a very early stage of your life. As in just in 12th standard, you in fact started preparing for CLAT before 12. So basically at 15 years of age you thought want to become a lawyer. Don’t rush things. Enjoy the process of reading. That’s why you don’t study law. You read law. Enjoy the process of reading law over the few years. Tell yourself that you are investing so early in a career because that is a career that takes so much longer to fruition. And I think you’ll have a nice life. You will enjoy the process of being a lawyer daily much more than trying to let yourself get hooked. That the first ranker and the second ranker in my law college division is now a partner at a tier one firm and what am I doing here. Enjoy.Work hard. Work hard. Enjoy. Things will be all right.
SS:So process more than outcome.
SR: I have till now realized one thing that if the process has been well set nine times out of 10, the outcome will also satisfy you. It may not be the outcome that you originally intended. But the satisfaction of the outcome will still be fairly high. So develop a robust process. Don’t try to think that you can do everything in 30 seconds or 40 seconds. Good lawyers and be good human beings. You are becoming a professional. The respect that a professional gets in life say against as against a businessman or somebody else. A businessman versus an artist versus a professional. An artist gets respect because he brings unknown things to life. A professional at least a knowledge based professional like a lawyer or a tax practitioner or a chartered accountant gets respect because you reduce the confusion or at least the idea should be. And that is why we are lawyers as called counsel. We have to reduce confusion for the people who come to us. Whether it is an in-house lawyers role or whether it is an external opinion, counsel role, reduce confusion. And that can only happen when you yourself have developed what is called as “Tehraav” (stasis/patience) in Hindi the right. You have to be still water for a very long time. Develop your skills, develop patience, develop reading, let go of fomo. You will become good lawyers and read SpicyIP.
SS: Thank you so much, sir.
SR: Thank you.
SS:It was a pleasure
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