The Delhi High Court on Monday issued detailed guidelines on the conduct of legal education in the country, pointing out how students' attendance shortage would affect their academic careers [Courts on its own motion in re: Suicide Committed by Sushant Rohilla, Law Student of IP University].
A Division Bench of Justices Prathiba M Singh and Amit Sharma ordered that no student can be barred from taking semester exams and that their progression into the next semester cannot be withheld for lack of mandatory attendance.
The Court made it clear that attendance norms which are over and above the Bar Council of India (BCI) regulations should not be prescribed by law colleges.
Their scores can be reduced by a maximum of 5%, if the college is awarding marks, or 0.33% if the institution follows the CGPA grading system, the Court said.
A detailed copy of the judgment is awaited.
The Bench directed that notifications of students' attendance must be communicated to the student and their parents and that extra physical or online classes must be held for those who fall short.
Further, the Court said that it would be mandatory for all law colleges, educational institutions and universities to constitute Grievance Redressal Commissions (GRCs). The Universities Grants Commission (UGC) must modify its regulations to ensure that 51% members of the GRC are students.
“There must be full time representation of students,” the Court added.
It directed the BCI to amend the condition of affiliation to colleges to include the number of councillors and psychiatrists available to help the students.
“BCI shall take a re-evaluation of mandatory appearance in three-year and five-year law courses…It shall incorporate and give credit to moot courts,” the Court stressed.
The Bench further directed the BCI to take steps to make details on internships available to students, especially for those from underprivileged backgrounds, by publishing the names of senior advocates, advocates, law firms and other bodies looking for interns.
The guidelines were issued by the Court while disposing of a suo motu public interest litigation (PIL) initiated after the 2017 suicide of law student Sushant Rohilla in Amity University.
It was alleged that he was subjected to harassment by the institution and some faculty members for maintaining low attendance. He was forced to repeat an entire academic year in the BA LLB course, which allegedly led to his suicide.
After issuing the guidelines, the Court commended the work done by amicus curiae and Senior Advocate Dayan Krishnan, as well as Rohilla’s family.
“They [Rohilla’s family and friends] have exhibited enormous resilience and deserve credit for fighting the cause,” the Court said.
Senior Advocate Dayan Krishnan appeared as amicu curiae in the case. He was assisted by advocates Sukrit Seth, Aakashi Lodha, Shreedhar Kale and Sanjeevi Seshadri.
Advocates Monika Arora, Subhrodeep Saha, Prabhat Kumar and Bhaskar appeared for IMC.
Amity Law School was represented through advocates Ashok Mahajan, Raajan Chawla, Gautam Chauhan and Shyam Singh.
Senior Panel Counsel Bharathi Raju, Central Government Standing Counsel (CGSC) Ashish Dixit and advocate Shivam Tiwari represented the Union of India.
Standing Counsel Avnish Ahlawat with advocates NK Singh, Laavanya Kaushik, Aliza Alam, Mohnish Sehrawat and A Chadha represented NSUT, DTU and IGDTUW.