Habibur Choudhury
Introduction
Habibur Choudhury is a solicitor, admitted in 2006, who was the compliance officer for legal practice of Archstone Solicitors Limited when the firm spent more than two years operating in breach of the conditions attached to its own authorisation. The Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal fined Choudhury and the firm £4,500, jointly and severally, after finding he had failed to ensure the firm’s compliance with those conditions, had failed to cooperate with the Solicitors Regulation Authority over a period of more than two years, and had let the firm trade without the website disclosures the SRA’s transparency rules require.
Background Information
Archstone Solicitors Limited had conditions imposed on its authorisation on 19 October 2022. Choudhury was the firm’s compliance officer for legal practice, the role responsible for ensuring the firm meets its regulatory obligations. The tribunal’s decision, from a hearing on 28 May 2026 with reasons published on 5 June 2026, covered a period running from October 2022 to at least November 2024, and in respect of the non-cooperation allegation to March 2025.
The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation
Regulatory compliance case, not a criminal verdict. The account below comes from the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal’s decision as summarised by the Law Society Gazette. The sanctions are civil regulatory penalties imposed on a solicitor and his firm for breaches of the SRA’s codes and rules.
The tribunal found that while acting as the firm’s compliance officer for legal practice, Choudhury failed to ensure Archstone’s compliance with the conditions imposed on its authorisation on 19 October 2022, a failure that continued until at least 11 November 2024. The firm itself was found to have failed to comply with those conditions between 20 October 2022 and at least 11 November 2024. Between 18 November 2022 and 11 March 2025, Choudhury was also found to have failed to cooperate with the SRA.
The tribunal further found that between 20 October 2022 and at least 11 November 2024 the firm’s websites published none of the information the SRA Transparency Rules 2018 require: no costs information, no complaints information, no display of the firm’s SRA number, and no SRA digital badge. The tribunal described Choudhury’s motivation for the misconduct as a form of professional inattention: he had not kept his focus on the matter and had not treated the breaches, when pointed out to him, with sufficient seriousness. It found the misconduct was neither planned nor deliberate, and that the principal harm caused was to the reputation of the profession.
Public Reaction and Consequences
The tribunal recorded that the breaches had ultimately been remediated: the non-compliant websites were removed and a compliant website put in place. On that basis it concluded that a financial penalty was the appropriate and proportionate sanction, and ordered Choudhury and the firm to pay a fine of £4,500 on the basis of joint and several liability, together with costs of £15,000, also joint and several. In a passage the tribunal directed at the case’s wider lesson, it emphasised that engagement with the regulator is not merely a matter of courtesy but a professional requirement which must be taken seriously.
The reported decision does not record any public statement from Choudhury or from Archstone Solicitors in response to the findings.
Current Status
The fine and costs orders against Choudhury and Archstone Solicitors were made at the conclusion of the hearing in May 2026, with reasons following in June 2026. Choudhury remains a solicitor: the tribunal’s sanction was financial, and no suspension, restriction or strike-off was imposed on him in the reported decision. The firm’s authorisation conditions and the remediation of its website disclosures were matters the tribunal recorded as resolved by the time of the hearing.
Impact on Their Career/Life
The case leaves Choudhury with a public disciplinary record as a compliance officer whose supervision of his own firm fell short for more than two consecutive years, spanning the authorisation breaches, the missing website disclosures and a non-cooperation period measured in years rather than months. For Archstone Solicitors, the fine and the published findings attach to a firm that spent the bulk of that period trading while in breach of the very conditions under which it was allowed to operate.
Sources
- Law Society Gazette, “SDT decisions: 25 September 2026” (respondents Habibur Choudhury and Archstone Solicitors Limited), 25 September 2026 — source