Justice must become central to the law curriculum, and community-based learning should give the desired value-orientation in the making of a lawyer. Professional education will have to be imbibed with a spirit of social service. There is no better way of inculcating it except through exposing law students to real-life experiences crying out for justice, Chief Justice of the Madras High Court A.P. Shah said on Monday.
He was inaugurating a three-day “Southern region cascade programme on law teaching and legal research skills,” jointly organised by the Tamil Nadu Dr.Ambedkar Law University, the British Council and Cardiff Law School, U.K.
Besides enabling students to acquire qualities and skills for successful practice, the curriculum should have a multi-disciplinary approach. Students should be made to realise that decisions on legal problems had widespread social, economical and political consequences.
Emphasis on rules
He examined the legal education system in the country since independence. The Bar Council of India’s bold and creative measures improved the standards of legal education, though many shortcomings were still to be addressed. The defect in the present system was that it was being imparted by a large number of part-time teachers who were practising lawyers without long-term commitment to teaching and research, admission of students in large numbers and poor libraries. Teaching laid emphasis on rules rather than on principles. There was an emphasis on memory, and doctrinal understanding of rules was absent. “The students rarely attend classes. Some students cram and pass the examination.” In major cities, one might find good law colleges, but not outside metro cities. Skills and ethics, which were the core values of the legal profession, were today neither taught nor learnt.
The National Law School had clinical programmes, and for others, the moot court and the so-called court visits formed the practical training. Students visited courts like going on a picnic and did not know what cases were argued. The void in the training of a lawyer required to be addressed early through collaborative efforts of teaching institutions and professional bodies like the Bar Council of India.
Dr. Ambedkar Law University Vice-Chancellor S. Sachidanandam, who presided, said a well-organised system of justice postulated the existence of a well-equipped bar. The university would do its best to improve the quality of legal education.
Phil Thomas, Course Director, Cardiff University, said the current economic changes required a new type of lawyers. Lawyers had to be global and understand new techniques and ideas.
Kartar Singh, Deputy Director, British Council, South India, said institutions in India and the U.K. were working for mutual benefit in a variety of areas.
http://www.hindu.com/2007/12/11/stories/2007121160650500.htm