Rajkiran Arhestey

Rajkiran (Kiran) accepts instructions in all areas of Chambers’ work and is a versatile advocate with a broad practice, particularly in clinical negligence, inquests, public law, public inquiries, tax, immigration, personal injury, environmental and planning, and criminal injuries compensation.

Kiran acts for both Claimants and Defendants and is a member of the Attorney General’s Panel of Counsel (‘C’ Panel). On C Panel she is building particular experience in judicial review, immigration, national security and tax.

She has a wide range of advocacy experience, both led and unled, having appeared in the Court of Appeal, High Court, Upper Tribunal, County Court, Coroners’ Courts, First-tier Tribunal, and in planning inquiries. She has also been part of the Grenfell Tower Inquiry’s Counsel Team for several years.

From January to April 2022 Kiran worked as a Judicial Assistant in the Administrative Court, gaining invaluable experience which informs her practice.

Before coming to the Bar, Kiran worked for the UN World Food Programme in Italy and a local NGO in Bangladesh and volunteered at Southall Black Sisters, assisting BAME survivors of domestic violence. She has a first-class degree in law from Oxford University and studied for an LLM at New York University (focusing on human rights), obtaining scholarships from NYU and through the prestigious Fulbright exchange programme. She was awarded Gray’s Inn’s highest scholarship, the Bedingfield, to finance the BPTC.

Kiran is founder and Editor-in-Chief of the 1COR Quarterly Medical Law Review (QMLR). She is a co-editor along with Sir Neil Garnham, Caroline Cross and Matthew Hill of the upcoming 2^nd edition of the Inquests Book (to be published in 2024).

Ranked in Legal 500 2023 as a Rising Star in Clinical Negligence: ‘Undoubtedly one to watch and heading for a stratospheric career despite her low-key manner’ and in Chambers and Partners 2023 as Up and Coming in Inquests and Public Inquiries: ‘She is a junior to watch. Very clever and a good advocate, with mature judgement.’

Kiran changed her surname from Barhey to Arhestey in 2024.