Venkateshwarlu Bandla

Findings — machine-extracted (anthropic-batch:claude-opus-4-8); verify against the decision

The Respondent, sole director of Ven Solicitors Limited, was found to have dishonestly misled the SRA on his 2015/2016 annual return by stating his firm was insured by AIG Europe Ltd (using a policy number from a previous Alpha Insurance policy) when he had no PII in place. He also abandoned his firm without effecting an orderly wind-down or notifying clients or the SRA, and left the country for India. The Tribunal found all three allegations proved, including express dishonesty under the Twinsectra test. Proceeding in his absence, and finding no exceptional circumstances, the Tribunal struck him off the Roll and ordered costs of £7,552.99. A later out-of-time appeal was refused and struck out as an abuse of process in 2025.

Duties found breached:

• Integrity
• Uphold public trust in the profession
• Act in the client's best interests
• No improper use of client money
• Orderly wind-down and contingency cover
• Cooperate openly with regulators

Aggravating factors:

• Deliberately and dishonestly misled the SRA to conceal lack of indemnity insurance
• Used previous insurer's policy number to mislead
• Failed to cooperate with regulator
• Abandoned firm showing complete disregard for professional obligations
• Did not engage with SRA or proceedings
• Ought reasonably to have known conduct breached obligations
• Planned and calculated conduct

Mitigating factors:

• Previous good record / no prior disciplinary matters