About Vikas
Vikas Dhar began his academic path in political science, earning a Bachelor of Arts from Washington University in St. Louis in 1999. He went on to attend Southern Illinois University School of Law, where he received his J.D. in 2003. Those years shaped the legal foundation he would build on in the years that followed.
After law school, Dhar established a presence in Massachusetts courts. He is admitted to practice in Massachusetts, before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, and in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts. He joined Dhar Law, LLP and has served as a partner there since 2010, handling matters that range from courtroom litigation to administrative proceedings.
Dhar’s résumé includes a mix of public-service roles and panel appointments. He served on the Federal Merit Selection Panel in 2012–2013 and again in 2021–2022, and he was a member of the National Clemency Project during the Obama Administration in 2014–2015. From 2016 to 2021 he worked as a hearing officer for the Board of Bar Overseers. Early in his career he participated in a state-level commission to revise the school code from 2002 to 2003.
He maintains an extensive set of professional memberships. Dhar is listed as a Fellow in the Litigation Counsel of America and holds memberships in the American Bar Association, the Boston Bar Association, and the Massachusetts Bar Association. He is active in criminal defense circles through the Massachusetts Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. He also belongs to the South Asian Bar Association and participates on the pro bono panel with Senior Partners for Justice.
Dhar is involved in lawyer well-being efforts. He currently serves as a mentor for the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Standing Committee on Lawyer Well-Being. That role runs alongside other ongoing engagements in both bar and community organizations.
His practice encompasses matters in state and federal courts and includes work tied to criminal defense and immigration-related issues. He has handled litigation and administrative matters, and his record shows involvement in panels and projects that interface between public institutions and individual representation. He currently practices at Dhar Law, LLP, where his work centers on criminal defense, federal litigation and immigration-related matters.
