BCI to SC: Rules scrapping 1-year LL.M programme effective from 2022-2023

RULES SCRAPPING the one-year LL.M programme will be brought into force only from the 2022-2023 academic session, the Bar Council of India (BCI) on Thursday told the Supreme Court, which is hearing a clutch of petitions challenging the changes.

Appearing for the BCI, Senior Advocate Vivek Tankha conveyed this to a bench headed by Chief Justice of India S A Bobde which recorded this in its order.

“Vivek Tankha, senior counsel on instructions from Manan Kumar Mishra, Chairman of the Bar Council of India who is present before us, states that the impugned rules are proposed to be brought into force from the academic sessions i.e. 2022-2023,” the bench, also comprising Justices A S Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian, recorded in order as it issued notice to the BCI seeking its reply to the petitions.

The court asked BCI to file its response within four weeks.

The court was hearing petitions, including one by the Consortium of National Law Universities, against the Bar Council of India Legal Education (Post Graduate, Doctoral, Executive, Vocational, Clinical and other Continuing Education) Rules, 2020, scrapping the one-year LL.M programme. The rules also state that foreign LL.M degrees would be equivalent to LL.M in India only if it is taken after obtaining LL.B degree from any foreign or Indian university which is equivalent to the LL.B recognised in India.