TEST AWAITS FOR FRESH LAW GRADUATES

Law graduates passing out from this year and intending to take up legal practice will have to pass an all-India Bar examination to be conducted by the Bar Council of India on December 5.

Every graduate after enrolment as lawyer in the respective State Bar Council will have to clear this examination, which will test skills and basic knowledge critical for a new entrant to the profession.

It is intended to check for eligibility, rather than expertise, BCI Chairman and Solicitor-General Gopal Subramaniam said here on Wednesday, after launching the BCI’s Vision Statement 2010-2012, which addresses the challenges before the legal profession and creating solutions.

The examination would be held once in six months and anyone failing in the first test could re-appear.

A legal consultancy firm, Rainmaker, will assist the BCI in conducting and managing the test in nine languages and in preparing the material for the test, for which it would collect Rs. 1,300 from each candidate.?

Mr. Subramaniam said: ?The Indian legal profession consists of approximately 11 lakh registered advocates, around 1,000 law schools and approximately 5 lakh law students. Every year, approximately 60,000 law graduates join the legal profession.?

Asked whether the BCI had taken permission from the Human Resource Development Ministry for conducting the test, Mr. Subramaniam said the council, as a statutory body, was not dependent on its approval.

On entry of foreign lawyers, Mr. Subramaniam said the BCI was opposed to it. Unlike in other countries, in India there was a standard of practice maintained by lawyers and they were not governed by earning money alone. The stage of allowing foreign lawyers has not yet come. The BCI was open to a debate on this issue.

KASAB APPEALS TO BOMBAY HIGH COURT

Mohammad Ajmal Amir Kasab, the lone surviving Pakistani gunman, who was sentenced to death for his role in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks, has filed an appeal in the Bombay High Court challenging the verdict and sought a legal aid panel to fight his case.

It has been reported that Kasab filed the appeal through the jail authorities and his plea for a lawyer has been forwarded to the High Court Legal Services Committee (HCLSC).

The HCLSC would now present Kasab’s plea for a lawyer before Acting Chief Justice J N Patel, who is patron in chief of Maharashtra State Legal Services Authority and senior Judge and Chairperson of HCLSC, Justice Ranjana Desai.

Earlier on May 6, Kasab’s defence lawyer K. P. Pawar said the decision about appealing to the High Court against the death sentence would be taken after consultations with the convict. A Mumbai Special Court on May 6 sentenced Kasab to death on four counts.

Judge M L Tahiliyani awarded death sentence for Kasab on-waging war against India, murder, conspiracy to murder, and participating in an act of terror under Unlawful Activity Prevention ct (UAPA).

Judge Tahaliyani felt that Kasab’s crime fell under the judicial definition of ’rarest of rare’.

Kasab, who is the 52nd prisoner on death row in India, was also awarded life term on five other counts.

EC TAKES BSP TO SC OVER SYMBOL

The Election Commission has moved the Supreme Court complaining that Bahujan Samaj Party, headed by UP chief minister Mayawati, was adopting stalling tactics in petitions seeking cancellation of its election symbol ‘elephant’. The EC said BSP had repeatedly stonewalled the commission’s queries on details of the number of statues of elephants and that of Mayawati installed at public/private places using government funds between 2007 and 2010 along with photographic evidence. It urged the apex court to direct BSP to furnish all relevant information sought by the commission in relation to the charges levelled by petitions, which accused the ruling party of installing a large number of statues of Mayawati and elephants on public expense.
In the petition filed by advocates Ravi Kant and Sukumar, the EC said BSP had taken a stand that EC had no jurisdiction to ask for any information despite the body being constitutionally mandated to conduct and supervise elections, which included allotment of election symbols and arbitrating any dispute relating to it.
The BSP had told EC that statues of elephants constructed by the state government out of its state budget were not similar to the election symbol of the party. Taking umbrage to such a stand,the EC told the apex court that it appeared as if BSP had itself decided the issue whether or not the elephant statues were a replica of its election symbol or not without bothering to furnish basic information sought by the commission.
The ruling party further told EC that the construction of statues was an action taken by the state government to implement the decision of the state legislature. “The political party cannot be penalized for actions of the government,” it had said.
Rejecting this contention, EC had written to the state on April 21 stating that its stand was untenable and that the party and the government would do well to assist the EC in providing the requisite information. But there was no response from the government, EC told the court.

PIL DUE ON AMBIGOUS JEE INSTRUCTIONS, FINALLY ARRIVES

JEE-2010 was not the first time that ambiguous instructions created confusion for the candidates. A close look at the JEE since 2006, when questions were first made available, reveals that it has been quiet frequent.

In fact, senior lawyer Prashant Bhushan, who is arguing a PIL on anomalies in the JEE, says he has been receiving a number of phone calls from parents and students who claim they did not get the expected result.

“Our plea is that candidates should be allowed a carbon copy of the answer sheet that they can take out. After the JEE, IIT should provide the answer key so that a student knows exactly how much he is going to score,” he says.

Ambiguous instructions relate to Multiple Choice Questions which have one or more correct answers without having any negative marking for selecting a wrong choice.

In 2006, questions carrying 72 marks had one or more correct answers without attracting any negative marking for a wrong choice. In 2007, such questions rose to 108 marks. In 2008, there was a marginal decline to 102 marks. In 2009 and 2010, questions carrying 96 and 93 marks, respectively, had oneor more correct answers without any negative marks.

In fact, after 2008 JEE, IIT itself published the questions and the answer key. It was found that for many questions all the options were correct. Therefore, it was possible for a candidate to get full marks by darkening all the bubbles.

When the matter came to light after this year’s JEE, IIT-Madras, which conducted this year’s JEE, told the Delhi High Court, which is seized of a PIL on the exam, that if any of the choices in such a question was found to be a wrong choice, the candidate would get zero.

The PIL has been filed by Rajeev Kumar of IIT-Kharagpur. As per the evaluation scheme submitted before the court, a candidate will get zero because he darkened a wrong choice along with correct answers.

SC SCOLDS POLICE FOR PLAYING WITH LAW

A day after expressing concern over Delhi Police allowing murder convicts to roam free when they should be in jail,the Supreme Court on Tuesday discovered that the malady extended to Punjab and might well be in vogue in other parts of the country.A vacation bench comprising Justices G S Singhvi and C K Prasad was livid when it found that petitioner Charan Singh,whose conviction by the trial court for throwing acid on others had been confirmed by the Punjab and Haryana high court,was still free and had not been put behind bars by police.
It is a matter of surprise that despite the trial court convicting the accused and the high court confirming the conviction four months ago,the police has not yet arrested the convict and put him behind bars, the bench said and directed senior superintendent of police,Ludhiana,to immediately arrest Charan Singh and submit a report to the apex court.
The bench said such laxity on the part of the police had made the criminal justice system suspect in the eyes of the public.Those who have clout,they flout the law, it said.
Criminal law has become an ass in the eyes of the public.We have an agency which is to arrest an accused after he is pronounced guilty by the court.If that is so,then how is it possible that the convicts are not arrested the bench said.
Trying to sensitise law enforcing agencies to the grave fallout of such inaction,the Bench said,In this,case acid was thrown on several persons who are scarred for life.Their lives are ruined.Yet,the convict is roaming free. The Bench said Singhs appeal challenging the HC verdict of February 2 would be heard only after the SSP of Ludhiana filed a report stating that the appellant had been lodged in prison.

BCI ASKS LAW SCHOOLS TO FALL IN LINE

The regulator of legal education in Bar Council of India has cracked the whip and asked over 930 law colleges across the country to either conform to the educational standards laid down by it or be barred from admitting students after 2011.

This ultimatum was sounded by BCI chairman and Solicitor General Gopal Subramaniam, who expressed serious concern over the manner in which the standards of legal education have fallen in many law collges, especially those in the hinterland.

The first and foremost task of BCI was to improve the faculty situation in a majority of the colleges. Talent could only be attracted to law colleges if they start paying the University Grants Commission approved pay-scale, Subramaniam told.

Secondly, all colleges must revise their educational curriculum and conform to the modern standards defined and laid down by BCI, he said. "All must conform to these standards by 2011 and those who do not will be barred from admitting students," the BCI chairman said.

Speaking on the innovative idea of making law graduates clear an entrance test before being permitted to practice in courts, Subramaniam said the idea had received support from the rural students who were upbeat that it will allow them to compete with their counterparts from national law schools.

"This entrance test is going to be a great homogenising effect. If a student from a rural law college passes this entrance test and qualifies to become an advocate along with a graduate from a prestigeous national law school, it will have a great balancing effect and remove disparity in attitude," he said.

Most of the law firms have also welcomed the entrance test, he said, adding the BCI was considering a proposal to conduct this examination two or three times a year so as to allow people adequate number of chances to become an advocate.

The Supreme Court had time and again suggested that young law graduates needed to be screened with some sort of a test before being allowed to practice in the courts.

JUST DISMISS THE CORRUPT


The Supreme Court has held that dismissal is the only form of punishment for those involved in corruption and misappropriation of public money,even if the embezzled amount is meagre.