Services
Infrastructure, Energy and Project Finance
Our Infrastructure, Energy and Project Finance practice offers integrated legal representation across diverse sectors. Our team has extensive expertise in infrastructure sector development in India, both in the area of policy and transactions.
Our lawyers take an innovative approach to project financing that enables commercial and practical solutions to manage risk in a timely and cost-effective financial closure. Our comprehensive understanding of the issues that impact project finance for diverse sectors enables us to deliver robust legal advice on all aspects of a transaction.
Our team, apart from its strong foundation in shaping legal policy in this area, has a strong reputation for negotiating innovative security structures and project documentation to ensure bankable and commercially viable projects. We have advised on some of the largest projects in India, which apart from being first of their kind, rank high in terms of complexity and innovation.
We work closely with various stakeholders including the Government of India, State Governments, public sector undertakings, multilateral agencies, developers, contractors, operators, investors and lenders in several key project related transactions. We also play a pivotal role as an advisor in shaping the legal framework as well as structuring transactions in the areas of oil & gas, power, airports, roads, ports, water, special economic zones and telecom projects. Our team has to its credit, the experience of working on some of India’s first privatisation transactions in these sectors.
We engage with our clients across the life cycle of a project, providing both legal and regulatory advice, harnessing the full potential of our knowledge, expertise and resources. Our experience spans the full spectrum including drafting, structuring, and negotiating various concession agreements, power purchase agreements, LNG sale purchase agreements, gas sale agreements, farm-in/farm-out agreements, gas transportation agreements, EPC contracts, financing agreements, security agreements, business purchase agreements, share purchase agreements, shareholders agreements, consortium agreements, and other related legal advisory work in the areas of projects, project finance, oil & gas, and corporate commercial advisory. Our Projects and Project Finance practice is well recognised for its outstanding work and has been consistently rated by international publications like Chambers Global and ILFR as the premier projects practice in India.
Being at the forefront of project finance and public private partnership (PPP) projects, we assist our clients in assessing and managing the many variables that can affect the outcome of a project. These may include political, social, legal and other risks that are inherent in such complex and large-scale projects. We advised the Indian Government on the national PPP policy and are also currently advising the government on the approach for renegotiation of PPP arrangements.
Areas of Focus
Power
In the Power sector, we have considerable experience on a wide range of projects, acting for owners and developers on power project development including drafting, advising on and negotiating various project documents such as implementation agreements, PPAs, fuel supply agreements, transmission arrangements, turnkey contracts for construction and long-term service agreements as well as financing documents.
Read More+
We also advise developers and lenders on an ongoing basis on a number of operational projects and act on behalf of developers and industrial consumers before electricity regulatory commissions and the appellate tribunal for electricity. We assisted in creating the optimum legal, policy, and privatisation framework that led to the privatisation of the first thermal power project in India employing the PPP model post the new electricity legislation. The Anpara ‘C’ project is today considered as one of the most successful PPP projects in the power sector and the structure set in place formed the basis of India’s ultra-mega power projects.
Airports
In the Airports sector, we have advised the Government of India on the privatisation of New Delhi and Mumbai airports. Considered as one of the most complex transactions in Indian aviation history and India’s first brown-field privatisation project, we were involved in the project since its inception in 1999 and played a pivotal role in drafting the concession agreements and the framework for the joint venture. In addition to this, we have also advised on green-field development of Bangalore International Airport. We continue to advise the developers and operators on a series of issues, including tariff determination, airport development & operating contracts and monestisation of airport land.
Railways
Our engagement in the Railways sector entailed working closely with RITES and the Indian Railways in developing a model concession agreement based on the public private partnership model for container traffic movement in India and was instrumental in the privatisation of private container freight train services plying on the Indian Railways network. We also advised the Ministry of Railways on the proposed development of high speed rail networks in India, and are advising Rail Land Development Authority (RLDA) and IRSDC (a subsidiary of IRCON Limited and RLDA), on the redevelopment of railway stations and associated commercial development at and around stations.
Oil & Gas
In the Oil & Gas sector, we offer fully integrated legal representation, having advised on upstream acquisitions and farm in arrangements, LNG sale and purchase agreements, acquisitions of capacity in upstream LNG liquefaction terminals, vessel charter and shipping arrangements, and all aspects of development and financing of LNG receiving and regasification terminals, and are also advising various public sector undertakings on their participation in the first floating storage and regasification unit in India.
We act as advisors to several Indian and international clients in Oil and Gas / LNG transactions, including Indian Oil Corporation Limited, Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Limited, GAIL, Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited, Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation, etc. as well as several lenders, developers, investors, contractors and operators, and are presently advising the Indian Government and GAIL on their involvement in the Turkmenistan – Afghanistan – Pakistan – India Pipeline project.
We engage with developers and lenders on all aspects of financing of projects, and have advised clients on several leading financing arrangements in airports, oil & gas, power, roads, railways and telecom sectors. We also routinely advise on debt reconstruction and restructuring, and are presently advising the lenders on a series of debt restructuring arrangements in the steel and stainless steel industries.
Read Less-
