Explainer · TPRM · Litigation
Third-Party Risk Management: Adding Litigation Checks (2026)
Modern organisations run on third parties: suppliers, outsourced service providers, distributors, channel partners. Each one is a door through which risk can enter, financial, operational, legal and reputational. Third-party risk management, or TPRM, is the discipline of keeping that risk under control across the whole relationship. Most TPRM programmes are strong on security questionnaires and financial checks, and weak on one thing: the third party's litigation and criminal exposure in court. This explainer, for Indian risk, compliance and procurement teams, explains what TPRM covers and shows exactly where a litigation check belongs at each stage of the lifecycle. Last verified October 2026.
- What it is: controlling the risk from vendors, partners and service providers across the relationship.
- The lifecycle: selection and onboarding, contracting, ongoing monitoring, and offboarding.
- The litigation check: surfaces a third party's court and criminal exposure at onboarding and keeps watching it.
- The gap: most programmes do security and financials well but skip litigation, where serious surprises hide.
01What TPRM is
TPRM is the structured way an organisation manages the risk created by the outside parties it depends on. The logic is simple: if a critical vendor fails, is enforced against, or turns out to be run by people facing serious cases, that becomes your problem, through disruption, loss, or reputational and regulatory fallout. TPRM aims to catch those risks before they land and to keep watching them through the relationship.
It is wider than a one-time check. A good TPRM programme covers the full life of a relationship, from choosing a vendor to winding one down.
02The TPRM lifecycle
TPRM is usually described as a lifecycle with a few clear stages:
- Selection and onboarding: assess a prospective third party before you commit.
- Contracting: set protections, warranties and the right to terminate based on what you found.
- Ongoing monitoring: keep watching the third party through the relationship, because risk changes.
- Offboarding: wind the relationship down cleanly and manage residual risk.
A litigation check has a role in several of these stages, not just the first.
03Where the litigation check fits
Litigation checks map neatly onto the lifecycle:
| Stage | What a litigation check does |
|---|---|
| Onboarding | Surface existing cases against the vendor and its people before you commit |
| Contracting | Inform warranties, indemnities and termination rights with what the search found |
| Ongoing monitoring | Catch new cases, enforcement or insolvency filed during the relationship |
| Offboarding | Check for live disputes that affect how you exit |
For the onboarding search, see litigation checks before onboarding a vendor; for the ongoing stage, ongoing counterparty monitoring after onboarding.
04Why litigation is the common gap
Most TPRM programmes handle information security, financial health and compliance certificates well, because those inputs are structured and the vendor supplies them. Litigation is different: the information sits in public court records the vendor will not volunteer, spread across many portals, and attached to people as well as the entity. So it is the layer most often left out or done as a shallow web search.
That gap matters because litigation is where the serious surprises live, an insolvency petition, an invoked guarantee, a fraud case against a director, none of which show up in a security questionnaire. See how to do litigation due diligence on a vendor.
05Covering the vendor and its people
A litigation check in TPRM should extend past the entity name to the people and entities that carry the real exposure:
- The vendor entity, with former and group names.
- Directors and key management, as individuals.
- Promoters and connected companies, sharing control.
- Guarantors, where relevant to the arrangement.
For a structured starting point, see the vendor due diligence checklist.
06Reading the result honestly
A litigation check strengthens TPRM; it does not certify a third party as safe. "Nothing on record" means nothing was found in the registries searched, on the date searched, under the names searched; a matter may exist under a different spelling or a related entity. A match on a common name may not be your vendor, which is why a confidence flag matters. And any litigation risk band is a triage aid built from public records, not a regulated credit score. The check informs a human decision; it is not legal advice.
07Where Claw fits
Claw is an all-in-one legaltech platform for Indian advocates, law firms, and corporate legal teams, combining AI-based case search, an AI legal assistant (Legal GPT), case management, and compliance automation across all Indian courts and tribunals.
ClawScore (at clawscore.clawlaw.in) is Claw's litigation and criminal-risk intelligence service, and it slots into TPRM at both the onboarding and the monitoring stages. You name a third party, and ClawScore searches 9,102 courts, benches and forums and returns every matter it finds in a single Excel workbook: a Summary carrying a risk band (Clean, Low, Moderate or High), a Matters sheet, a Related parties sheet covering directors and guarantors, and a Coverage sheet showing what was searched, so the vendor and the people behind it are checked together. Every finding carries a match confidence, so a hit on a common name is flagged rather than assumed. Constant Monitoring then watches your vendor list and reports New filings, Changed movement and Closed disposals on a daily, weekly or monthly scan, which is the ongoing-monitoring stage of the lifecycle. Results come back in under 5 seconds, judgment search spans 30 crore+ judgments with Supreme Court decisions from 1950 and High Court decisions from 1990, and Claw does not use your searched names or documents to train its AI models. The risk band is a triage aid from public records, not a regulated credit score; "nothing on record" means nothing was found in these registries on the date searched under the names searched; and the workbook is a risk input, not legal advice.
To add litigation to your TPRM programme, run a case search across Indian courts by party name across every forum in one place.
08Sources and further reading
- eCourts (court case status): ecourts.gov.in
- Ministry of Corporate Affairs (company and director records): mca.gov.in
- Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India (insolvency records): ibbi.gov.in
- Claw: clawlaw.in
This explainer is general information, not legal or compliance advice. TPRM obligations depend on your sector and regulator, so take professional advice before you rely on it.
09Frequently asked questions
What is third-party risk management (TPRM)?
TPRM is the discipline of identifying, assessing and controlling the risks that come from an organisation's vendors, suppliers, partners and service providers. It runs across a lifecycle: selection and onboarding, contracting, ongoing monitoring, and offboarding.
Where does a litigation check fit in TPRM?
At onboarding it surfaces existing cases against the vendor and its people; at contracting it informs warranties, indemnities and termination rights; during the relationship, ongoing monitoring catches new cases, enforcement or insolvency; and at offboarding it checks for live disputes that affect how you exit.
Why do most TPRM programmes miss litigation?
Because litigation information sits in public court records the vendor will not supply, spread across many portals and attached to people as well as the entity. Security questionnaires and financial checks use structured inputs the vendor provides; litigation is harder, so it is often skipped or done as a shallow web search.
Should the litigation check cover the vendor's directors?
Yes. Exposure attaches to the people behind the business. A litigation check in TPRM should cover the vendor entity with its former and group names, its directors and key management as individuals, promoters and connected companies, and guarantors where relevant.
Does a clean litigation check make a vendor safe?
No. It reduces risk but does not certify safety. "Nothing on record" means nothing was found in the registries searched, on the date searched, under the names searched. A matter may exist under a different spelling or a related entity, and the check informs a human decision, not legal advice.