A law student from a National Law University (NLU) recently ran into trouble for having written a Substack post on the Supreme Court's decision to ban a chapter in the NCERT Class 8 textbook. .As per a redacted screenshot of the email shared by the law student, the Tamil Nadu National Law University (TN NLU) administration allegedly asked him to delete his post. The email stated,"I am receiving a spate of phone calls from Advocates of the Supreme Court and various High Courts as well as a few Judges and Students of Law complaining and criticising your article posted in LinkedIn. The reputation of the Institution is at stake. Therefore, I request you to take down the article immediately in the best interest of the university and yourself.".Replying to the email from the administration, he refused to pull down his Substack post titled 'The Supreme Court of India has No Spine', stating,"My opinions are mine alone. Any attempt to conflate them with that of the university is clearly wrong. It should be clear that the university has absolutely no jurisdiction over my personal expression. You do not own my voice or my conscience.".Speaking to Bar & Bench, the law student said that he did not receive any response from the University after his reply to the mail..The Substack post in question criticised the conduct of the Bar, the language used by the Supreme Court and the judiciary with regards to the banning of the NCERT chapter. The NCERT chapter on the role of the judiciary had two paragraphs titled 'Corruption in the Judiciary' which led to it being banned. .In a response to a query by Bar & Bench, TN NLU Registrar, Prof (Dr) SM Balakrishnan clarified that they did not issue any mandate or directive to remove his blog nor did they take any punitive measure. "We take pride in nurturing our students to be torchbearers of law, justice, and constitutional values. The University does not, and will not, kowtow to the external pressures that seek to undermine these foundational principles. In the present instance, it is clarified that the University did not issue any directive or mandate requiring the student to take down the article. The communication referred to by the student was in the nature of a request and advisory, made in good faith. This was necessitated in light of representations received from certain members of the legal fraternity who had expressed strong objections to the language employed in the article and had called upon the University to initiate action against the student. The University, however, categorically declined to take any punitive measures.".The Registrar states the mail sent to the student was only to apprise him of the situation and reconsider the content, and his responsibility in the use of language.
