Member Spotlight April 2022 – Uphar Dhaliwal

This month’s member spotlight is on member Uphar K Dhaliwal.

Uphar Dhaliwal grew up in a farming family where she learned the importance of hard work and stick-to-itiveness at an early age. Fraser Valley memories of three generations of family toiling, sweating and laughing together while working toward a common goal never left her and helped ensure she would return home one day. Uphar’s diverse legal career began at the prosecuting attorney’s office in Bellingham, Washington where she appeared daily in court as a Rule 9 intern to deal with criminal law and traffic matters. Uphar then went on to join a boutique law firm in downtown Seattle where her practice focused on supporting international business clients with their immigration and corporate needs. She transitioned from this role to act as in-house legal counsel where she ensured corporate and state compliance with regulatory laws and managed the law firms retained by her company in all 50 states.

After spending years abroad, Uphar felt the call of home which led to a return to her roots in the Fraser Valley so that she could serve the community in which she was born and raised. Uphar knew that the best way to give life to her dynamic approach to the law was through the unfettered freedom of her own law firm which led to the creation of Dhanu Dhaliwal Law Group. Uphar practices family law, immigration law (both in Canada and the United States) and is a licensed Family Law Mediator at Dhanu Dhaliwal Law Group. She understands that effective advocacy is not just about trying to change someone’s mind with legal reasoning, it is also about impacting someone’s heart with real life stories. Uphar’s hallmark as counsel is her heartfelt and passionate approach toward telling her client’s story.

Uphar is always an active member of any community she is a part of and takes great pride in being a founding member of the Washington branch of the South Asian Bar Association. She has presented on various legal topics on numerous occasions to lawyers, law students and other legal industry related professionals.

Today, Uphar enjoys nothing more than spending time with her large immediate and extended family as well as giving back to the community that has given her so much. She loves to cook, savour different cuisines and throw large dinner parties and even taught an Indian cooking course just for kicks.