Allow law teachers to practice in courts: NLU Consortium

In a bid to encourage students to take up litigation as a career, the Consortium of National Law Universities (NLU Consortium) has called for allowing law teachers to practice in courts..In order to improve clinical legal education and to attract “bright students of NLUs” to take up litigation as a career, it is necessary for law teachers to go to courts themselves along with the students, a release issued by the NLU Consortium states..The Executive Committee of the NLU Consortium, under the Chairmanship of NALSAR Vice-Chancellor Prof Faizan Mustafa, called for the same in a meeting held on February 19 at NALSAR, Hyderabad. Prof Shamnad Basheer had earlier written to the Bar Council of India (BCI) asking it to relax the rule barring law teachers (classified as full-time salaried employees). Prof Basheer had written to the chairman of Bar Council of India on February 19, 2019..Currently, Rule 49 of Part VI, Chapter II of the Bar Council of India Rules prohibits full-time salaried employees from practicing as advocates. The Rule states,.49. An advocate shall not be a full-time salaried employee of any person, government, firm, corporation or concern, so long as he continues to practise, and shall, on taking up any such employment, intimate the fact to the Bar Council on whose roll his name appears and shall thereupon cease to practise as an advocate so long as he continues in such employment..In this light, the Consortium has stated,.“…not allowing Law Teachers to practice in the Courts of Law is harming the legal system as Law Teachers are as important the stakeholders in the legal system as lawyers and judges and can contribute meaningfully to the legal system…”.The release goes on to state that law teachers should not be treated as salaried employees, and that there is a need to bridge the gap between law in books and law in action..The Consortium has also foreseen limits to the extent to which teachers can appear in courts. It has been suggested that no teacher from the NLUs should be allowed to appear in court more than three times a month, or spend more than 15 hours in a week on litigation lawyering. Further, teachers allowed to appear in courts should mandatorily teach a course on clinical legal education..Restrictions on the amount of fee charged by the teachers have also been suggested. While the Consortium hopes that such teachers will appear in cases pro bono, should a fee be charged, the same should be split between the teacher and the University to which she belongs in a 60:40 ratio..In case law teachers are not permitted to practice, the Consortium has envisioned a Non-Practicing Allowance (NPA) for them, at par with medical doctors. This issued will be taken up with the University Grants Commission (UGC), the release states..The Consortium has also resolved to constitute a Grievance Redressal Committee to address issues surrounding CLAT 2019, which will be held on May 12 this year. This Committee will be headed by a former judge of the Supreme Court and will also comprise two former Vice-Chancellors and two present Vice-Chancellors of NLUS, who are not part of the Executive Committee of the NLU Consortium..It has also been resolved that the UGC Guidelines for written examinations with respect to persons with disabilities will be followed in CLAT 2019.