Liberate legal education from the control of the Bar the Bench the Government and Corporate Houses says former NLS VC Dr Mohan Gopal

The Government College of Law, Trivandrum, recently organized a unique event titled “Inheriting the wisdom of ages”. The function was organised to felicitate and honour the alumni of the college who are now members of the judiciary..The said alumni included Justice Cyriac Joseph, former Supreme Court judge as well as six sitting judges of the Kerala High Court; namely Justices S. Sirijagan, T. R. Ramachandran Nair, Harun ul Rasheed, V. Chidambaresh, A. M. Shaffique and A. V. Ramakrishna Pillai..The key note address was delivered by former National Law School of India University (NLSIU) Vice-Chancellor and former National Judicial Academy (NJA) Chairperson, Dr. Mohan Gopal..In his address, Dr. Gopal said that the, “Indian judiciary is the most powerful and at the same time it is the least accountable too. That is unfortunate. Right from the appointment of judges, transparency is absent.”.Enlightening the audience with his thoughts on legal education, Dr. Gopal said, “Legal education reforms are a failure; except for the establishment of five year LL.B. course and the NLS model.” He also stated that he was not a supporter of the five year LL.B. model and the three year courses need to be strengthened. He pointed out that Bar Council of India should not regulate the legal education sector in India and he emphasised the need for liberating the control of legal education from the Bar, the Bench and the Government. He also spoke of the need for liberating the legal education sector from the control of corporate institutions specifically referring to the Jindal Global Law School model..He supported giving greater autonomy to the law colleges and asked them to compete with each other in terms of innovative syllabus and curriculum. “Law colleges must be primarily driven by the needs of the students”, Dr. Gopal said..National University of Advanced Legal Studies (NUALS), Vice- Chancellor, Dr. N. K. Jayakumar presided over the function. Prof. S. Usha, Principal, Government College of Law, also spoke on the occasion. Current NJA Chairperson, Prof. K. N. C. Pillai also attended the function. Justice Cyriac Joseph could not make it to the function due to unavoidable reasons.