ABVP seeks HRD intervention in evening law classes

Eyeing the upcoming student union elections, ABVP led DUSU today submitted a memorandum to HRD ministry seeking intervention in scrapping of evening classes for law courses by the Bar Council of India.

"This is a critical issue and has been there for many years now. The prospectus mentioned the faculty has a total of 2400 seats following which the student came forward for enrollment.

"But after the BCI's recommendations the seats have been cut to half the number...We spoke to BCI and it said that if the university gives an undertaking to upgrade the infrastructure in a year, it will reconsider the recommendations," DUSU president Satender Awana said during a press conference.
 

He said that the union has submitted a memorandum to HRD ministry and Vice Chancellor Yogesh Tyagi in this regard.

The issue is being raised by all student groups active on campus including ABVP, AISA and NSUI, especially at a time when union elections are due next month.

The BCI has asked DU to shutdown colleges offering law courses in the evening shifts.

The recommendation has been made after a committee of BCI, the apex regulatory body for legal education and legal profession in the country, submitted an adverse report about infrastructure and quality of education imparted at the centres of DU's law faculty.

Around 800 students are currently enrolled in the DU evening colleges offering law.

In an unprecedented move, BCI had in 2014 decided to derecognize DU's law course after it failed to seek timely extension of the affiliation of its three centres, namely Campus Law Centre, Law Centre-I and Law Centre-II.

It was granted a provisional extension of affiliation for the 2014-15 session after DU had proposed to shift to a new building which it claimed "had adequate space" for the faculty to run properly.

However, after a fresh inspection by a BCI panel, the council had noted that besides fresh violations, the illegalities earlier highlighted remain unattended.

Following this, the BCI issued it a show-cause notice to explain the "illegalities" in its functioning including more than permissible student strength, lack of infrastructure and faculty.

The council had in January communicated to the university to shutdown colleges offering law courses in evening shifts, saying such programmes do not ensure proper quality of legal education.