When law students look at India’s leading corporate law firms today, it is easy to see the large offices, major transactions, prestigious clients and hundreds of lawyers. What is much harder to see is how these institutions were actually built.
The story of Zia Mody and AZB & Partners is particularly useful if you are interested in corporate law, law firm careers, mergers and acquisitions or eventually building a legal practice of your own.
AZB did not begin as a massive law firm. Zia Mody started with a relatively small practice of around 12 lawyers. Over time, that practice evolved through changing market conditions, strategic partnerships, client relationships and a clear focus on professionalisation.
For a law student or young lawyer, this journey offers something more valuable than a success story. It shows how legal careers can evolve when expertise, timing and long-term thinking come together.
How did Zia Mody’s legal career begin?
Zia Mody always wanted to become a lawyer. Early in her career, she worked with Baker & McKenzie in New York, where she gained exposure to corporate legal practice.
But the Indian legal market she returned to was very different.
At that time, India had significant restrictions on foreign investment, and the kind of cross-border mergers and acquisitions work that lawyers routinely handle today was far less common.
This meant that the corporate experience she had gained abroad could not immediately be used in the same way in India.
Instead of treating this as a career setback, she adapted.
For approximately the next decade, Mody appeared regularly before courts as a barrister. This gave her experience in litigation before she eventually moved back towards corporate law.
There is an important lesson here if you are still deciding which area of law to pursue. A legal career does not always follow one straight line. The practice area you begin with does not necessarily determine where you will spend your entire career.
Legal careers often evolve with the market, opportunities and skills that you develop along the way.
If corporate practice is something you are considering, understanding whether corporate law is right for you is more useful than choosing it merely because leading law firms appear attractive.
Why was India’s 1991 liberalisation important to Zia Mody’s journey?
India’s economic liberalisation changed the commercial environment significantly.
As India opened its economy, international companies became increasingly interested in doing business in the country. Indian companies also began participating more actively in global markets.
This created demand for lawyers who could understand both Indian regulation and international corporate transactions.
Zia Mody was particularly well positioned for this transition because she already had international corporate law exposure.
She moved back towards corporate practice and established the Chambers of Zia Mody, commonly known as CZM.
The practice initially had around 12 lawyers.
That number is worth remembering.
Many students see a large law firm and assume that its scale was always there. In reality, major professional institutions frequently begin with relatively small teams that build credibility one client and one matter at a time.
What made the Chambers of Zia Mody different from an ordinary small practice?
Starting with 12 lawyers was not remarkable by itself. What mattered was the ambition behind the practice.
The goal was not simply to create a chamber that depended entirely upon Zia Mody personally.
The larger idea was to build a professional organisation capable of advising sophisticated Indian and international businesses.
This distinction is particularly relevant if you someday want to build a law firm.
A successful individual practice and a successful law firm are not necessarily the same thing. An individual lawyer can build an excellent reputation based largely on personal expertise. A law firm, however, requires systems, people, delegation, training, consistency and institutional credibility.
That difference would become increasingly important as CZM expanded.
How did strategic partnerships lead to the creation of AZB & Partners?
One of the biggest turning points came when Zia Mody began building alongside other established lawyers.
How did Bahram Vakil become part of the journey?
Zia Mody and Bahram N. Vakil joined forces, and CZM eventually evolved into CZB.
Their ambition was clear. They wanted to create a professional, top-quality Indian law firm with scale.
The plan included operating in multiple cities, rapidly expanding the lawyer base and developing relationships with major Indian corporate clients.
By thinking nationally rather than simply locally, the organisation positioned itself for a much larger role in India’s developing corporate legal market.
How did Ajay Bahl enter the picture?
Ajay Bahl and Bahram Vakil had known each other from the period when India’s energy sector was opening up in the 1990s.
Bahl and Mody had also worked on opposite sides of transactions.
Those interactions allowed them to understand each other’s professional approaches.
They found similarities in working style, client commitment and the kind of institution they wanted to build.
Ajay Bahl & Co. had a strong Delhi presence, while Mody and Vakil had developed their practices in Mumbai and Bangalore.
Bringing these practices together created an opportunity to combine geographical reach, talent and client relationships.
When was AZB & Partners formed?
In 2004, CZB and Ajay Bahl & Co. merged to form AZB & Partners.
The name brought together the three founding partners:
Ajay Bahl, Zia Mody and Bahram N. Vakil.
The merger also created something strategically important. Instead of slowly building a presence in every major commercial centre independently, the combined firm could leverage established teams across Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore.
For students interested in working at large firms, it is worth understanding the wider ecosystem of leading corporate law firms in India and how different firms have developed their practice areas, cultures and strengths.
How did AZB build trust with major corporate clients?
One of the most important elements in AZB’s development was its approach to legal advice.
Zia Mody has explained that the philosophy was not to simply tell clients what they wanted to hear.
The firm would identify the problems first and then work towards practical solutions.
That approach sounds simple, but it captures an important feature of sophisticated corporate practice.
A client does not hire a lawyer merely to receive confirmation that a proposed transaction will work. The lawyer must identify what could go wrong.
That means understanding regulatory restrictions, contractual risks, tax implications, corporate structures, commercial realities and the client’s appetite for risk.
For a young corporate lawyer, this is an important shift in mindset.
Your job is not merely to know the law.
Your job is to understand how the law affects the business decision your client is trying to make.
AZB also built its reputation through responsiveness and hard work. Mody described the early culture as effectively being available around the clock.
In major transactions, that responsiveness can become extremely important because different parties, advisers and businesses may be operating across jurisdictions and time zones.
Trust was therefore created through a combination of legal knowledge, practical problem-solving and dependable client service.
Why did cross-border M&A become important to AZB’s growth?
AZB developed particular strength in cross-border mergers and acquisitions at a time when India’s integration with international markets was increasing.
Bahram Vakil identified cross-border M&A as one of the firm’s important areas of expertise.
Between the early 2000s and the global financial crisis of 2008, significant transaction activity connected Indian businesses with companies and investors in the United States and Europe.
AZB was well positioned for this work.
The firm could understand the Indian regulatory environment while also appreciating the expectations and risk concerns of international businesses.
This combination created an advantage.
If you are considering a career in corporate law today, M&A remains only one part of the broader transactional ecosystem. Corporate lawyers may work across private equity, banking, capital markets, competition law, commercial contracts and regulatory matters.
Understanding what corporate lawyers actually do across M&A, private equity, banking and other practice areas can help you identify which part of corporate practice interests you most.
What can law students learn from AZB’s client-first approach?
The AZB story becomes particularly useful when you convert it into lessons that can apply to your own career.
First, learn to understand the client’s business. A good corporate lawyer does not look at every problem purely as a legal question. You should understand the transaction, industry and commercial objective behind the legal issue.
Second, become comfortable identifying problems. Students sometimes assume that being useful means immediately finding a positive answer. Good legal advice can also mean explaining why a particular structure creates unacceptable risk.
Third, responsiveness matters. Technical knowledge may help you enter the profession, but reliability can determine whether clients and senior lawyers trust you with important work.
Fourth, keep learning outside your narrow specialisation. Complex commercial matters often involve multiple areas of law at the same time.
A transaction may involve company law, taxation, competition law, foreign investment regulations, contracts and industry-specific regulation.
The strongest lawyers gradually learn how these pieces interact.
Why is the banyan tree important to AZB’s philosophy?
AZB’s banyan tree symbol represents much more than branding.
For Zia Mody, it represents established branches creating new roots, which then grow independently and strengthen the larger tree.
Applied to a law firm, the meaning becomes clear.
Senior lawyers develop younger lawyers. Those lawyers eventually establish their own reputations and become leaders. They then mentor another generation.
Ajay Bahl associated the banyan with longevity, strength and shelter, while Bahram Vakil connected it with wisdom, strong roots and a broad canopy.
For a student looking at the firm from outside, this symbolism contains an important career lesson.
Professional growth should eventually create growth in other people.
If you become a partner, senior counsel, team leader or successful practitioner, your long-term influence will not only be measured by the matters you personally handle. It will also be reflected in the professionals you train and the systems you help create.
Why does Zia Mody want AZB to become less dependent on its founders?
This may be the most interesting part of the AZB story.
Many successful professional organisations become closely associated with their founders. During the early stages, that can be useful because the founder’s reputation attracts clients and talented professionals.
But excessive dependence on a founder can eventually become a weakness.
Zia Mody has spoken about the need for Indian law firms to become more professional and less founder-centric.
Her long-term vision is for AZB to institutionalise further so that the firm becomes less dependent upon Ajay Bahl, Bahram Vakil and herself.
Think about what that means.
Building a respected personal practice is an achievement.
Building an organisation that continues producing respected lawyers without depending on one individual is a different level of institution-building.
That is ultimately what the banyan tree represents.
What should young lawyers take away from Zia Mody’s journey?
Zia Mody’s career offers several lessons, but perhaps the most important one is adaptability.
She trained in international corporate law, returned to an Indian market where that work had limited application, spent years in litigation and then moved back into corporate law when India’s economic environment changed.
She then built a small practice, entered strategic partnerships and helped create a much larger law firm.
At each stage, the career evolved.
If you are currently in law school, this should reduce some of the pressure to have your entire professional life planned immediately.
You should certainly make thoughtful career decisions, but you should also develop transferable skills that remain valuable when opportunities change.
Legal research, drafting, commercial awareness, communication, negotiation, client management and the ability to learn quickly can serve you across several different legal careers.
The profession will continue changing. New industries, regulations and technologies will create areas of practice that may not even be prominent today.
The lawyers who notice these changes early and prepare for them can often create opportunities rather than merely compete for existing ones.
Final Thoughts
The story of Zia Mody and AZB & Partners is not simply about how a famous lawyer built a famous law firm.
It is about recognising change, adapting to new opportunities, finding the right professional partners, understanding clients deeply and thinking beyond individual success.
What began as a relatively small practice of around 12 lawyers gradually became part of a large professional institution.
For young lawyers, perhaps the strongest lesson is this: do not think only about the next internship, job or designation. Think about the skills, reputation and professional relationships that you are building over the next decade.
Careers are built matter by matter. Institutions are built generation by generation.
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