NALSAR has not complied with affiliation norms: BCI tells Telangana High Court

The Bar Council of India (BCI) recently informed the Telangana High Court that NALSAR University of Law has yet to comply with its Legal Education Rules in terms of BCI affiliation..Appearing for BCI, Senior Advocate L Ravichander reportedly told a Bench of Chief Justice Alok Aradhe and Justice J Sreenivas Rao that out of the 32 law colleges in Telangana, only 19 have complied with norms and have been granted renewed BCI affiliation for this year..Varsities including NALSAR and Kakatiya University are lagging behind in complying with such norms, he added. .As per the BCI's Legal Education Rules, law colleges and universities cannot impart legal education without approval of the BCI. Such approval or affiliation is granted after the BCI conducts an inspection to determine whether the institution has adequate facilties, faculty etc.In an affidavit filed in the matter, BCI said that it has been urging law colleges to comply with its norms to expedite the affiliation process. It said that it has warned colleges that if they do not comply with the norms and rectify deficiencies, they will not be allowed to take admissions for the academic year 2023-24.As regards NALSAR, BCI said that the matter was being considered by a committee of legal education..After hearing the BCI's submissions, Chief Justice Aradhe, who is also the Chancellor for NALSAR, orally observed that the University is a coveted institute which should not be dragged into this controversy. He then recused himself from the matter and listed it before another bench headed by Justice Sujoy Paul. .The Court was dealing with a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by Advocate Bhaskar Reddy who sought directions to law universities and the BCI to expedite their admission processes for LL.B./LL.M. courses. He had submitted that these colleges must adhere to the academic calendar provided under the University Grants Commission (UGC) norms by completing counselling and admissions before July each year."For the past several years, the admissions to law courses in Telangana are delayed causing untold hardships, uncertainty and mental harassment to thousands of law studies aspirants. It is learnt through Web that in 2018 when there was similar delay in notifying the counselling/admission, a newspaper report indicated that BCI has not released the list of approved colleges in the State and possibly the same reason is holding up the admission process year after year," the plea reads..Petitioner A Bhaskar Reddy appeared as party-in-person.Senior Advocate P Sri Raghu Ram appeared as Amicus Curiae.Senior Advocate L Ravichander and Advocate Aadesh Varma represented BCI.Additional Advocate General Mohammed Imran Khan appeared for the State.Advocate C Vani Reddy appeared for the Telangana State Council For Higher Education.Advocates S Balakrishna and Jagannatha Rao represented Osmania University..[Read order]