Founders increasingly use ChatGPT to understand term sheets but get answers grounded in US law or generic guidance, not Indian practice. This is the founder prep tool law firms send before kickoff. This playbook is different. Grounded in Indian law.
Founders are using ChatGPT to understand term sheets and getting the wrong answers.
Generic AI tools do not cite Indian law. Your founders deserve better before they walk into your office.
Generic AI tools get Indian law wrong
ChatGPT and Claude sometimes reference UK or US law sources, cite outdated positions, or hallucinate market practice. For a founder reading about their term sheet, that is a real risk.
Founders sign what they don't understand
Early-stage founders rely on AI-generated summaries of their term sheets and get answers grounded in foreign law or generic common law, not the Companies Act 2013 or FEMA.
No India-specific playbook exists
Existing resources were written for global markets. They don't cover what Indian legislation actually constrains, what is genuinely negotiable, or what market standard looks like here.
About the author
Built by someone who did the deals.
Not a textbook. Not a template service. Built by a corporate lawyer with hands-on experience advising on Indian VC transactions — from both sides of the table.
JN
Jyotirmoy Nath
Corporate Lawyer · VC Transactions · India
Advised early-stage companies on seed and Series A fundraising, and advised top-tier investors on portfolio company due diligence and deal execution. Experience spans drafting and negotiating SHAs, SSAs, CPs, CS, and closing documentation. Has acted as both founder counsel and investor counsel, coordinating across multiple investors in the same round.
Founder counselInvestor counselSHA · SSA negotiationDue diligenceCPs · CS · closing docsMulti-investor coordinationSeed · Series A
From the author
The thinking behind the playbook.
A practitioner's essay on AI, Indian law, and why founders need better than ChatGPT.
EssayJyotirmoy Nath · 26 June 2026
Building a Legal Research Tool for Indian Term Sheets
"Founders rely on generic AI for term sheet guidance and get answers grounded in foreign law, not the Companies Act 2013 or FEMA. A tool grounded in Indian law changes that."
On why generic AI tools cite the wrong law, how a RAG-based playbook was built in two weeks with no engineering background, and what the constraints revealed.
Query in plain English. Get structured, India-specific answers — grounded in actual legislation, not ChatGPT guesses. Try it below.
This is a static preview with limited sample outputs. Free-text queries are not connected to a live search. The RAG based working model is available on request.
termsheet-playbook.vercel.app
Note: The full product runs on a working RAG model with an India-specific legal knowledge base, and answers queries live. The above is a static preview of that experience. Source code of the acutal RAG based model is available on GitHub. Happy to share a live demo on request. View on GitHub →
How it works
Three steps from question to answer.
A straightforward RAG pipeline built for Indian deal rooms — no hallucination, no foreign precedent.
1
Ask a question about a clause in the term sheet.
Type your question in plain English — about liquidation preference, anti-dilution, drag-along, or any other provision you're working through.
2
The RAG engine retrieves the relevant legal material.
The system searches an India-specific knowledge base: Companies Act 2013, FEMA, and the NDI Rules 2019, rather than sourcing from unverified sources.
3
The answer explains both perspectives, with citations.
You get a structured response covering the founder counsel and investor counsel positions, grounded in the legislation that actually governs your deal.
What it does
Better preparation before the kickoff call.
Built for founders who need structured legal reasoning — fast, grounded in Indian law, and honest about its limits.
Both sides of the table
Every clause is analysed from founder counsel and investor counsel perspectives. Understand what the other side actually wants before you pick up the phone.
Grounded in Indian law
Companies Act 2013, FEMA, and the NDI Rules 2019. Not US precedents. Not generic common law. The statutes and market practice that actually govern your deal.
Query in plain English
"Is put option enforceable in India?" "What's market on anti-dilution for seed?" Get structured answers with legislation cited — not guesses.
Red flags surfaced
Know which clauses are negotiating traps, which are standard, and which depend entirely on whether you're acting for the founder or the fund.
Honest about its limits
If a query falls outside the knowledge base, the tool clearly says so. It acknowledges its limits rather than speculating.
Interested? Let's talk.
This is a practitioner-built tool for Indian deal rooms. This is only for informational purposes and does not constitute legal advice.