Shomik Datta
Shomik is a Property and Commercial litigator with over 20 years of experience.
He has been rated as a leading junior in all aspects of property litigation (including landlord and tenant disputes, whether commercial or residential) for many years.
He has developed a particular expertise in interpretation disputes and the intersection of equitable doctrines such as (all species of) estoppel and waiver with various forms of property dispute.
Recent examples of his work include:
(a) Rail For London v LB Hackney [2022] EWHC 2929 (Ch), a £200m dispute as to the interpretation of rent provisions within a leaseback scheme ancillary to an infrastructure development, with ancillary estoppel by convention issues.
(b) Dell v 89 Holland Park Management Ltd [2022] UKUT 169 (LC), the single largest service charge dispute, relating to the recoverability of legal costs incurred in litigation with third parties. Appeal to the CA pending.
(c) Merthyr (South Wales) Lts v Merthyr Tydfil CBC [2019] EWCA Civ 526, a dispute arising from the enforcement of a £15m escrow fund agreement to secure remediation works from Europe’ largest open cast mine. Of note by the reaffirmation of the exclusionary effect of the parol evidence rule extending to pre-contractual documents that might evidence the genesis and object of later written provisions.