Sonu Bhasi, the lone successful candidate of last year’s Solicitor exam, is one of future India’s top-class lawyers. Self-made, she does her homework well to align with her dream of being an upright lawyer. Hard work never fails and nothing is impossible, she proves unequivocally as she climbs each step with a smile.
A girl from a non-lawyer class family choosing as royal a profession as a lawyer with great curiosity is an exception. Sonu Bhasi has none at home or in the neighborhood to guide through her chosen profession, as her parents had a totally different career background. With plenty of unsuccessful lawyers around, one who chooses this profession with great optimism also needs to stay well prepared for a challenge.
When there is a perception that good lawyers are mentored by titans in the profession, Sonu is all out to prove it wrong by her self-motivation to be one of the top-class lawyers of future India. She is all set to prove herself a self made example of success.
Sonu had the freedom and also enough optimism to choose her profession, which she brilliantly did, finally to make her parents feel proud of her success. She has chosen her career with enough wisdom and moved prudently to be outstanding in the crowd of young lawyers. Her educated parents hailing from Kerala didn’t want to confine her to their interest in terms of career choice and dictate what their daughter must do in her life. “It is her freedom,” VS Bhasi, her father, points out.
The adherence to the value system and the culture that the Bhasi family has nurtured within ultimately elicited enough contentment to themselves. Spiritual teachings of saints have left in them some influence. “She has been nurturing in her all the qualities Swami Chinmayanand wanted in a child from her childhood,” Swami Nirbhayananda quoted in a message to her after her success in the Solicitor exam. More have they learned, humbler have they become. While enjoying the urban life, they grapple with the values they have learned. Each day, either at the dinner table or at the free evening time Bhasi’s four-member family sits together and keeps the bonding stronger.
An extra brilliant since her secondary school days, Sonu developed a reading habit and polished her skill in logical reasoning, which is inevitable for being a lawyer worth reckoning. “I used to read a lot of books, especially biographies, autobiographies and fiction,” she says. The habit of reading has sharpened her sense and strengthened the spontaneity of thoughts.
With admirable academic history, she passed out each exam either with a first rank or with a distinction. She completed her B.Com from R.A Poddar College in 2015 and LLB from Government Law College, Mumbai in 2018, all with the first rank. For the LL.B first rank, she was endowed with Arunaditya Vishnu K. Dhurandhar Gold Medal. She also got the Sir Jamshedji B. Kanga Golden Jubilee Memorial Prize from the University of Mumbai, for securing the highest aggregate marks in the first-year LL.B. In the same year, she won Shri Madhavrao Shankarrao Pandit M.A. (OXON) Bar-At-Law Scholarship for securing the highest aggregate mark.
A steady stream of awards and scholarships that came to her further embellished her dossier. She was awarded the Shri Venkiteshwaran scholarship for securing the highest marks in Environmental Law and Contract Act and Shri. M.C. Chagla Scholarship for the first rank in LL.B, besides Letter of Appreciation from Government Law College for outstanding academic performance.
In the Solicitor exam in October 2019 conducted by the Bombay Incorporated Law Society, she stood the first rank. She was the only candidate to successfully clear the articled clerk examination out of around 120 candidates. The list of accomplishments has been quite long. Yet, she looks for new heights in her career, which she is quite confident of conquering. “I like to handle litigation where I find huge space for expanding knowledge base and acquiring versatile experience and expertise,” she says.
To be successful in the profession of law, one has to prove a high level of language power and drafting skills. Sonu studied her academic portion not merely to score marks alone, but with an aim to build a sound knowledge of what she studied. Her language skill, prudence and analytical sense enabled her to draft excellent pleadings.
Her only brother, Swaroop, younger to her, is now a second-year BCom. Simultaneously, he is also preparing for the CS exam (now Executive program). Mother Nivedita, is a housewife, though a qualified nurse with BSc.in nursing. Bhasi, a Physics Graduate hailing from Thrissur, Kerala, is now engaged in the software service business.
