In Conversation with Dr. Gayathri Bai S, BMS College of Law

Dr. Gayathri Bai S is an Assistant Professor at BMS College of Law, Bengaluru. In this interview conducted by Campus Ambassador Charishma, the professor talks about her journey as an academician, the importance of research, and more..You have been in the teaching field for fifteen years. Please share with us some of your rewarding moments as a teacher and an academician.I must say, it’s a wonderful journey with different sets of students from different backgrounds. Teaching is a learning process where we get to learn many things from others specially from students. Every day we mould our personality as academicians. After completing the course, it’s great to see them as our colleagues at the Bar; it’s one of the best rewards for a teacher. .You are the faculty coordinator for Consumer Law, Advocacy and Research Centre (CLARC) at BMS College of Law. What is the objective of CLARC?The Consumer Law, Advocacy and Research Centre is a wing with multidimensional purpose: to serve general consumers by creating awareness about rights, government initiatives, providing legal advice, assist the government by collecting data about the needs of the citizens and ensure their initiatives are reaching the consumers, and helping budding future lawyers to gain some field exposure and hands-on experience..What are some of the activities that CLARC is proud to have undertaken?The Centre regularly conducts seminars, conference and workshops relating to consumers rights and issues. A Walkathon & Paper Bag Distribution was organised by the Centre to Commemorate World Consumer Rights Day on 15 March, 2021 to create awareness about reducing the of plastic bags. The programme was inaugurated by Sri. Ravi Subramanyam, MLA, Basavanaguadi. To encourage competitive spirits among the students, the Centre regularly conducts article writing, essay writing, and photography competitions on various topics..The COVID – 19 pandemic has confined consumers to their homes, resulting in a spike in e-commerce. How has this impacted the landscape of Consumer Rights in India?The pandemic is a blessing in disguise for e-commerce entities in the present scenario. Consumers have seen massive transformation in online purchase due to pandemic. E-commerce provides various platforms to choose goods as per their requirements and The E-Commerce Rules, 2020 is playing a vital role in protecting the interest of consumers specially form online frauds..In your opinion, is creating awareness among consumers alone sufficient or do we also need to focus our efforts on strengthening the Consumer Dispute Redressal mechanism?In my opinion, enforcing rights itself is not sufficient. Consumers should be aware about the redressal mechanism to get justice. The new Consumer Protection Act, 2019 has provided mediation as a new avenue for disposal of consumer disputes. The CLARC is making all the efforts through various activities to equip consumers in this aspect..You have multifarious publications to your credit. What is the key to writing an effective research paper?We need to identify the issues relating to the societal problem which really needs to be addressed through laws. Being a law teacher, I opine that writing research articles help us to go into the depth of the problem and find solution to overcome. The research activity helps us to move out of our comfort zone and opens new avenues to gain knowledge about new areas.