Exclusive interview: HNLU Raipur vice-chancellor Paramjit Singh Jaswal of less than three months formally announced to students that he would join RGNUL Patiala as its new vice chancellor for personal reasons. He told Legally India that he would continue being part of the HNLU family and would face new challenges at RGNUL.

Breaking: The Bar Council of India (BCI) said yesterday that all 22,267 applicants for the all India bar exam have been sent their preparation papers and that the first exam go ahead as planned by 6 March 2011.

Jindal Global Law School (JGLS) and US Michigan law school have held a virtual classroom hosted in India, with “seamless” state-of-the-art video technology allowing students to participate in real time.

Outlook India defended itself against the criticisms in last year’s complaint by NUJS Kolkata professor Shamnad Basheer and two students against Outlook and India Today for publishing allegedly error-riddled and misleading law school rankings. Outlook revealed the details of its complex weighting system of ranking but declined to publish further information, in what the NUJS complainants called a ‘lackadaisical manner’.

Exclusive: The Bar Council of India (BCI) has again declined to disclose detailed information in respect of its contract with the company running the postponed all-India bar exam, following an appeal to an earlier right to information (RTI) request.

However, the BCI has now reversed its response to the original RTI and claimed that it did in fact solicit tenders from competing service providers - Tata Consultancy Services, Sify and Imaging Solutions - before it awarded the contract to Rainmaker.

Law minister Veerappa Moily said the government had finished a Bill to set up a new National Commission for Higher Legal Education and Research, which would replace the BCI as the regulatory body responsible for legal education, recognition of law colleges and a unified law school curriculum.

NUJS Kolkata has announced the 2011 CLAT (Common Law Admission Test) with radical changes, including distribution through the Indian post office network and the ditching of static general knowledge and legal knowledge questions. Meanwhile, the law school diversity project IDIA has pledged to fund admission fees for all students in need.

Colleagues, students, friends and family are mourning the tragic loss of recent Nalsar Hyderabad graduate and legal campaigner Fatehpal Singh who passed away on Friday following a road accident last week.

Exclusive: The Supreme Court today allowed the Bar Council of India’s (BCI) transfer petition clubbing together six high court writ petitions challenging the all India bar examination (AIBE) but declined to hear the exam’s constitutional validity just now citing its postponement to March next year.

The Bar Council of India (BCI) has published the pro-forma undertaking that 2010 graduates will need sign before practising, agreeing to take and pass the bar exam in future.

The Bar Council of India (BCI) has circulated a resolution to state bar councils to make 2010 graduates give an undertaking to pass the bar exam before practising law.

The Bar Council of India’s website has officially confirmed that the bar exam has been postponed to 6 March 2011, although only shortly afterwards the website went offline after the domain name barcouncilofindia.org was not renewed.

Latest update: All 2010 law graduates may be able to practise law subject to giving an undertaking they would clear the all-India bar exam within two years, according to a bar council source.

In an unexpected turn the all India bar examination (AIBE) transfer petition may now be scheduled for hearing by a division bench on or after 29 November according to one authoritative source, with completion of the summoning process making way for adjudication on merits.

An email from the BCI has confirmed that the bar exam date has been “pushed” and that the body would make a formal statement on 25 November.