In a significant development in the sphere of legal education, National Law School of India University (NLSIU) Bangalore is set to launch a three-year LL.B programme for graduates from next year.
An announcement to this effect was made by NLSIU Vice-Chancellor Prof Sudhir Krishnaswamy at the University's 29th Annual Convocation held on October 31.
In his address, he said,
"In 1988, the University was launched on the back of an audacious curricular experiment: the 5-year integrated BA LLB programme. This experiment succeeded beyond expectations and secured NLS’s legacy as the institution that incubated and radically disrupted legal education in India.
Three decades after that initial success, today, we announce the launch of a new interdisciplinary 3-year LLB embedded in an experiential learning pedagogy. The University has secured the necessary regulatory approvals from the regulatory authorities as well as the governing bodies to launch this programme."
The course will be operational from the next academic session starting July 2022.
Prof Krishnaswamy also revealed developments made towards financial sustainability of the University. He said,
"In the last two years we’ve reversed our legacy of budget deficits through a careful mix of augmenting our revenues and tight expenditure control; we’ve recruited highly qualified staff to ensure that our current financial policies will preserve the University’s financial autonomy while creating the headroom and resources to adopt aggressive and sustainable growth plans.
In this Financial Year, we’ve refunded a portion of student fees to ameliorate the adverse Covid pandemic conditions, and still generated surpluses that we’ve committed to rebuilding core infrastructure at the University. After several years, our annual audited account statements have no qualifications by our Statutory Auditors due to exceptional effort put in by our Accounts and Finance team to ensure that we decisively turn our back on past practices, and are ready to move ahead with confidence."
As revealed earlier, the Vice-Chancellor also spoke about the Inclusion and Expansion Plan 2021-25, through which the University aims to increase diversity by admitting students from various marginalized and disadvantaged sections of society. As per the plan, NLISU is looking to expand its intake to 2,200 students across all programmes, by 2028-29.
In line with this vision, the University also aims to secure an additional parcel of 12 acres of land with the support of the Karnataka government. It plans to construct 90,000 square feet of classroom and learning spaces, and 2,50,000 square feet of residential facilities. It received a grant of ₹5 crore from the Infosys Foundation for its library to augment capacity, rezone the library and its surroundings, and adopt a digital learning and inclusion initiative.
Prof Krishnaswamy further revealed the University's aim to achieve a 1:15 faculty-student ratio across all programmes. He said,
"So we will grow the faculty from the current strength of about 40 to about 115 faculty in the next few years. We also aim to develop a research faculty cadre to recruit scholars dedicated to path breaking research, and re-organise research publications to achieve and sustain internationally peer-recognized scholarly output."