In Conversation with Poonam Verma, Partner, JSA

Ms Verma talks about, her wonderful journey in law, her biggest inspiration, her work at J. Sagar and Associates, thoughts on featuring in the inaugural edition of BW Legal World’s 40Under40 and much more in this exclusive interview with Ashima Ohri

Poonam, would you please tell us where did this illustrious journey begin and at what age did you decide to study law. Please walk us through your early years of education and the decision of becoming a lawyer. 

Thank you Ashima for having me here and giving me the opportunity to share some of my experiences. Well, being an army kid, I travelled around the country during my primary and secondary education. Had no fixed base. You may recall that about 20 years back, for a science student there were only two career choices were- doctor or engineer. I wanted to be an engineer and was fascinated with the Army Institute of Technology, Pune. In my last two years of school, my desire to join an army college and be an engineer boosted even more. However, one fine day, my father mentioned to me that a new army law college is now coming up, would you want to fill up the form? Having no idea about law, no lawyer in the family or friends, I still said- yes, why not? Those days there was no CLAT. That’s how law actually happened. In fact, my fascination to engineering continued till my first year of law college. As luck would have it, I started enjoying the law. Once I got interested in my law subjects, there was no looking back. Scored well and got to represent my law school in the most prestigious moot courts, interned as a clerk with Justice (retd) C.K. Mahajan, Delhi High Court and many other wonderful opportunities. Being a first generation lawyer, was very jittery in the final year- what will happen when I graduate, where will I work, what will I do  etc. Since then I have always put my heart and soul into the profession. God has been kind!

Please click here to read the full Q&A shared by Poonam Verma published in BW Legal World.