Zeeshan Saquib Mian

Introduction

Zeeshan Saquib Mian is a solicitor-turned-barrister who was struck off the roll of solicitors by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT) in September 2026 after being found to have dishonestly concealed his disciplinary history from the Bar Standards Board (BSB) when he sought to qualify as a barrister. Mian, 47, was admitted as a solicitor in 2007 and held a practising certificate between July 2007 and October 2016, after which he remained on the roll as a non-practising solicitor. His former firm, of which he was one of two directors, was intervened in by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) in October 2016 — the opening event in a chain of regulatory trouble that ended with his disbarment in 2022 and, four years later, the loss of his solicitor’s standing altogether.

Background Information

Mian qualified as a solicitor in 2007 and practised for just over nine years, holding a practising certificate from July 2007 until October 2016. He was one of two directors of the firm where he practised. In September 2016, conditions were imposed on his practising certificate, and the following month the SRA intervened in the firm. Rather than remain in solicitors’ practice under those conditions, Mian changed course: he was called to the bar by Lincoln’s Inn in November 2016, a month after the intervention. He was disbarred in June 2022, and remained on the roll as a non-practising solicitor until the SDT’s 2026 ruling removed him from the profession’s foundational register as well.

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation

Adjudicated vs. alleged. The findings below are regulatory findings made by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal on the civil standard (the balance of probabilities), not criminal convictions, and no criminal proceedings were reported. Mian’s June 2022 disbarment was likewise a bar-regulator decision, not a court outcome.

Before his call to the bar, Mian was found to have failed to disclose relevant regulatory information and/or to have given false or misleading declarations to the Bar Standards Board and/or Lincoln’s Inn. The concealed material included details of the conditions imposed on his practising certificate — the very regulatory facts a would-be barrister is obliged to declare. He was also found to have failed to disclose relevant regulatory and/or disciplinary information to the BSB in the period between his call to the bar and December 2018, when the BSB notified him of its decision to investigate his conduct. Beyond the repeated non-disclosure, the tribunal found that Mian had been dishonest.

The SDT’s assessment of that dishonesty was unambiguous. The judgment said Mian “knew the conditions and their publication were significant” and that his failure to notify both the BSB and the Inn was “deliberate”. The “harm to the regulatory process and to public confidence was substantial”, the SDT said, and Mian’s culpability was high. In the tribunal’s words: “His misconduct was motivated by a desire to avoid the risk that disclosure of the SRA conditions, regulatory enquiries and later SDT referral would jeopardise or affect his admission, call, or standing at the bar.” The misconduct was “deliberate and calculated”.

Public Reaction and Consequences

The consequences unfolded across both of the legal professions Mian belonged to. In June 2022 he was disbarred, ending his career at the bar three and a half years after the BSB notified him of its investigation. The SDT’s sanction followed in 2026: striking him off the roll, the tribunal said this was the “only appropriate and proportionate sanction”. Mian was also ordered to pay £40,000 in costs.

On insight and remorse, the tribunal found little comfort to weigh against the strike-off. Mian “did not show meaningful insight into the seriousness of the misconduct”, and the SDT “did not find evidence of genuine remorse for the dishonest failure to disclose” — although Mian “expressed regret for the position in which he found himself”. The distinction the tribunal drew, between regret at his own predicament and remorse for the deception itself, underpinned its decision that nothing short of removal from the roll would do. No appeal against either the disbarment or the strike-off was reported.

Current Status

Mian is struck off the roll of solicitors and disbarred. He cannot practise as a barrister, and his name no longer appears on the solicitors’ roll he joined in 2007. He also carries a £40,000 costs order from the SDT. The Law Gazette’s report of the strike-off, published on 18 September 2026, recorded no application to be readmitted to either profession and no further proceedings of any kind.

Impact on Their Career/Life

The strike-off closed a nearly two-decade legal career that had already been reshaped by regulatory action. Striking Mian off, the SDT said: “The misconduct went to the heart of professional trustworthiness. The dishonesty was not momentary, technical, or confined to an isolated lapse. It was repeated, deliberate and concerned information which another regulator was entitled to receive in order to perform its own regulatory function.” The case’s shape — SRA conditions imposed in 2016, concealed from the bar’s gatekeepers ahead of a November 2016 call, sustained non-disclosure until 2018, disbarment in 2022, removal from the roll in 2026 — illustrates how a failure of candour toward one regulator followed a professional across both branches of the profession, ending in exclusion from both.