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‘Doomed to fail’: Solicitor pushes ahead with futile claims against law firm
Apparently not dissuaded from being shut down and criticised by multiple courts and the Fair Work Commission, a solicitor has pushed ahead with a “hopeless and doomed to fail” application for leave to appeal against a decision in favour of his former law firm.
Naomi Neilson
Last December, Prateek Patial was told by the Fair Work Commission his application against boutique firm Kailash Lawyers & Consultants was both “nonsense” and “entirely hopeless”, but that did not prevent him from pressing ahead with a similarly futile application.
Justice Robert Bromwich of the Federal Court threw out two applications for leave to appeal – one for a decision in the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia (FCFCOA) and the other the Federal Court – after he found both were “doomed to fail”.
“In my view, the application for leave to appeal was doomed from the outset and it never had any prospect of success. In my view, this application should never have been brought,” Justice Bromwich said in his decision for the application in the FCFCOA matter.
Back in August 2021, the Fair Work Commission tossed out the first of Patial’s claims against Kailash Lawyers, with commissioner Donna McKenna ruling he could not bring unfair dismissal proceedings because he was under a “non-employee agreement”.
Patial had turned up at the Kailash Lawyers office unannounced in April 2021 for legal supervision under his practising certificate.
In August 2020, after he was apparently “highly personally affronted” by a comment made by the director of Kailash Lawyers, Patial refused to leave. It ended with a stand-off in which both called the police.
Following a number of attempts to punish the firm, the FCFCOA granted an application that ordered Patial to pay costs awarded by the commission of the Fair Work Commission in the sum of $36,398.05.
Dealing with his leave to appeal application in this matter, Justice Bromwich said that contrary to appeal constraints, Patial “attempted to relitigate aspects of the history of the dispute and, in particular, the basis upon which the costs order was made by the commissioner”.
Referring to his written submissions, submissions in reply, the application itself and his oral submissions, Justice Bromwich said Patial did “not come close to establishing any error”.
The second leave to appeal application concerned an order made by a judge of the Federal Court to dismiss an interlocutory application filed by Patial to submit a further statement of claim.
Justice Bromwich was not satisfied there was any error to be found.
A separate aspect of the application for leave to appeal concerned an allegation of apprehended bias on the part of the Federal Court judge, with Patial specifically referring to earlier hearings in which the judge allegedly acted “unfairly and gave a better run … to the respondents”.
Justice Bromwich said the primary judge was “meticulous”, and nearly all of Patial’s points were “at the trivial end of the spectrum”.
“In all the circumstances, the application for leave to appeal was at all stages completely hopeless and doomed to fail. In my view, it should never have been brought,” Justice Bromwich said.
The FCFCOA case is Patial v Kailash Lawyers Pty Ltd trading as Kailash Lawyers and Consultants [2025] FCA 114.
The Federal Court case is Patial v Kailash Lawyers Pty Ltd trading as Kailash Lawyers and Consultants [2025] FCA 113.
Naomi Neilson
Naomi Neilson is a senior journalist with a focus on court reporting for Lawyers Weekly.
You can email Naomi at:
