Partner, Trilegal
Meyyappan Nagappan is a Partner at Trilegal. He is a Pemanda Monappa Scholar and has graduated from Cambridge University with a Masters of Law specializing in International Taxation and Economics. Prior to joining Trilegal, he worked in the Chambers of Mr. Mohan Parasaran, Solicitor General of India between 2010 – 2014; and was involved in some of the landmark international taxation disputes including the Vodafone Indirect Transfer tax case.
He does a mix of transactional, advisory, policy and litigation work. He has established a unique and market leading ESG, impact, and climate finance practice that has advised on the most complex structures in the space and provided innovative solutions. He has worked on new award-winning structures, investment products, outcome/results-based financing constructs that involve the blending of private (profit-seeking) and philanthropic capital. This includes India’s largest livelihoods focused impact bond which was awarded the AVPN Constellations Awards 2023, India’s first climate and agri focused impact bond, first-ever issuance of listed, green, NCDs for climate smart agriculture, structuring agreements for mobilising green capital in India, as well as structuring operations for sale of carbon credits from an Indian legal, regulatory and tax perspective.
He has also done extensive work advising and acting as lead transaction counsel for the biggest non-profit charities on complex impact bonds launched in India, structuring technical assistance grants and impact investment funds, advise in relation to India’s first USD 1 Billion education outcomes fund, first loss guarantees, climate finance, green bonds, carbon credits, ESG financing, social stock exchange listings and advising on blended finance structures covering tax, CSR, ESG and FCRA aspects.
He has advised foreign governments and regulators on legal, regulatory, and tax aspects of enabling climate finance through blended finance instruments in the APAC region with a focus on Indonesia, Philippines, and Nepal. He is also working with Securities and Exchange Board of India, International Financial Services Centres Authority, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Ministry of Finance, and Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare on policy matters in relation to blended finance and climate financing. He is also providing policy assistance to Niti Aayog for setting up and structuring a unique green finance institution for accelerating and catalysing investments in climate finance space in India to meet the net-zero target by 2070 in association
with UNDP and Indian Private Equity and Venture Capital Association.
He was awarded the International Bar Association Taxes Committee Scholarship-2018 and speaks regularly at the IBA conferences. He was the National Reporter for India as part of the IBA’s National Reporter programme, was a member of the technical committee of the International Fiscal Association(IFA)- India Branch, Bloomberg’s Tax Management International Forum Board. Meyyappan has been invited to be part of World Bank Taskforces on Innovative Finance and UNDP Sustainable Finance initiatives as an expert. He has also been invited to deliver sessions on ESG by various organizations, including RBI and Harvard University in relation to sustainable banking practices; UNDP and UNEP FI for Regional Workshop on Strengthening Regional Partnerships for Climate Transition, Bangkok; and UNDP Bhutan office on ESG finance, carbon credits, climate funds and other forms of impact finance.
