Leave out fancy degrees and publications: who does the best job in teaching and making classes interesting in your college? It will be nice to have a list because other colleges can also invite these professors as guest lecturers.
NLSIU: Every single one of the new joinees (of whom must are alumi) are good teachers. For this credit must go to the VC, as the previous VCs were against hiring alumni.
Could you name some of the new faculty hires at NLSIU who are delivering their subjects well? I ask because it will be beneficial for students from other colleges who want to invite them for guest lectures/visiting elective courses or to even watch their recorded content online. In the long-run, we will all benefit if the best academic content reaches a larger number of law students all over the country.
I agree that these five were among the more engaging teachers inside the classroom. I personally learnt a lot more from them through the discussion on project topics and feedback on the written work submitted to them. Friends from other colleges should note that Prof. Amita Dhanda has retired a few months back and Jagteshwar Sohi Sir (International Law, Environmental Law) has left NALSAR to pursue a full-time PhD in Canada. Among those who have joined in recent years, current students have good things to say about Dr. N. Manohar Reddy (English) and Dr. Manisha Sethi (Sociology), both of whom are experienced persons having taught for several years at other Universities. When it comes to the younger teachers, Sahana Ramesh (Investment Law, Company Law) and Chinmaya Deshmukh (Administrative Law, Legal Philosophy) are getting good reviews from students. Sudhanshu Kumar (Company Law, Capital Markets, Competition Law) is also quite competent and covers the material really well. From what I am hearing from the present 3rd and 4th years, even Prof. Vasanthi Nimushakavi (Constitutional Law, Gender Studies) seems to have pulled up her teaching standards in recent years. Having said all this, there are some areas where NALSAR really needs better people, especially Criminal Law, Family Law and Evidence.
Because when this thread started years ago, they weren’t in the conversation of being the best teachers at NALSAR. Now that others have left you can legitimately claim them to be among the better ones left.
Mostly agree. But - Jagteshwar's left NALSAR. Dhanda's no longer here in a teaching capacity. There have been a few young faculty hires with overseas LLMs recently - S. Ramesh, N. Salar. Can say that they put in effort and are more connected with the reality of students, teach well too. V Malik also. JGLS poached A. Kumar, else she was great to have for private law.
Is the official party line that A Kumar got poached? I thought that she had plenty of reasons to not be happy with how she was being treated at nalsar. She couldn’t teach her specialisation for one thing which makes no sense given how well she’s doing now that she is teaching it at jgls. She also didn’t get scale on time. That she left intending to focus on her PhD and then ended up eventually taking up the jgls gig.
"Did not get scale on time" - how long was she at NALSAR? One complete semester and the Covid shortened semester. People have to work longer than that to get scale. And no, she did not get poached. She [...] left.
I guess anonymous comments from students and alumni are not helpful beyond a point. For those who may want to assess how good or bad some of the above-named NALSAR faculty members are, I have collected some Youtube links with their recorded talks or lectures. I hope that this helps students from other law colleges.
3) Prof. Amita Dhanda, 'The Construction of Exclusion in the Indian Constitution', 7th Constitution Day Lecture, Daksh Bangalore (November 2018) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_0pNgzlxAQ
@NUJS - Mazumdar, Bhat (for Space Law), Dasgupta, Bhattacharjee, Guha my personal favourites among those who have taught me. Others may be included too.
This list is almost the same as mine would be. The last two especially have always been there for me round the clock regardless of the nature of the problem that I had been struggling with. I would also add Ruchira Goswami to this list, and one of the alum guest faculty, Darshana Mitra.
NLUD - Anup, Arul, YP. (Aparna and Mrinal used to be top tier, but have since moved to NLS). AK Rai. Contentious but I would add Sophy, Danny, and JSM. JSM has his problems for sure, but I remember a lot I learnt during his admin law course (same for Sophy). I think Amita Punj is pretty good but people may disagree. Maheshwar and Surya Prakash Mishra really know their stuff and can teach vv well, but I think they are just coasting. If they decide to bring in their A game, they would be top tier for sure. We have been blessed with some fantastic seminar courses, but I don't think its fair to add them here.
Amita Punj is pretty good and knows her subject. My only criticism is that she tends to get carried away on her train of thought while lecturing.
This one is gonna be super contentious, but I think Dr. P was also decent. Sure, [...], but he also tried to make his classes fun and ran the language lab for kids struggling with English. [...]
I agree on the punj criticism. Teaching and marking aside, I think she is a lovely person. I once screamed at her for something irrelevant in class. Irrespective of my behavior, she was kind and gracious to ask my why I was angry and helped me out. I admire her and respect her for that.
Maheshwar and Surya Prakash Mishra really know their stuff and can teach vv well, but I think they are just coasting.
v true. They both realise that they're in a law university where their subjects are not a priority. They are both brilliant and if you make an effort to strike a conversation with them, you really begin to appreciate how much knowledge these guys have. Also, I'd like to add Ruhi Paul's name to this list - she's knowledgeable [...].
Yeah, Ruhi is good. Except I realised/learnt she was good only much later. Wish her classes had focussed more on the Arb Act. her preference for ADR (med/neg) over Arb is perhaps reflected in her curriculum, but she does know her law well..
If any Symbiosis Hyderabad student is reading this, can they suggest the names of a few good teachers that they might have? Along with the subjects, preferably. Thanks in advance.
Did you forget Nunes Sir and Nidhi Ma'am? Excellent Teachers at GNLU. Ranita Ma'am, Jagadeesh Sir, and Uday Ramakrishna Sir are brilliant academicians as well, however, they might need some work on their delivery and class engagement.
Kian, please moderate this thread carefully so that it does not turn into a mudslinging session or institutional gloating contest. If people want to point out the faculty whom they liked be taught by, that should be allowed. Nothing else. If someone has got a different list of their own for the same institution, then they should just post it as a comment, and stop there.
Can someone respond to this comment with the names of some good Corporate Law faculty across the institutions? Please only mention the people who have taught you, not rumour or hearsay. I am particularly keen to know about people from places other than the NLUs or JGLS, but feel free to mention people from those places too. Same for CPC.
Imo Sahana is slightly better than Sudhanshu despite her having just started when we were taught (Company Law). She's more diligent, thorough and also extremely helpful. According to those who've take her electives (Arbitration) she's also extremely good at that which is not surprising considering that's her core expertise. Sudhanshu is excellent as well, ofcourse.
Sahana was not around when we were there. Sudhanshu's great, good to know they have found a second person for the subject.
I also rate Sudhanshu and Sidharth for sticking around, especially now that even Jagteshwar has left. These three along with Manav, Ajey, Anshuman, and Surya (now being spoken of highly by NLUD folks) had all joined around the same time when we came to NALSAR. We were lucky to study from all of them, sad to see only 3 remain now.
Shouvik Guha, NUJS. Taught my batch Corp 1, and an introductory paper on project finance. Knows his stuff, patiently answers every question, decent guy.
There was this person who had taught our batch both CPC and Property Law. He was very good and did not make those papers seem dry at all. SK Nandy. He used to train the IAS officers too once.
Some of the people here are knowledgeable and good communicators, but I would not call them good teachers, as they are heavily biased politically and try to brainwash students. For example, a good teacher explains human rights by teaching us the relevant laws and how things work in practice, instead of a lengthy sermon on patriarchy and gender, or what XYX philosopher said, or ranting against a certain ideology you don't like (for I can dig out abuses by people of your own ideology that are 10 times worse).
I am sure you can dig out abuses far worse than anyone named here makes. Your family must be proud of you.
PS: There is some difference between abusing and intellectual/academic comment. PS-2: Neither is (university) education value-neutral nor is it supposed to be.
AK Rai from NLUD is pretty great for Banking, as are Arul Scaria and Yogesh Pai for IP. Competition and Arbitration (investment, commercial) are seminar courses so they are taught by visiting faculty who are almost always very good but don't really count as 'college professors'.
I think there was a thread (pre conversation, in one of the regular LI posts) about this earlier. Indian law schools do not have great faculty in corp-ish courses. NLUD student here, I only know of AK Rai (Securities/Insurance), YP and Arul (IP) at NLUD who are fantastic. Even in other colleges, the only names I can think of are Sahana Nalsar, Rahul Singh NLS, that contracts/corp prof at NUJS.
As a community, we really need to have more people taking corp courses. We cannot continue to ignore it in the academia.
I think both Sahana and Sudhanshu at NALSAR are good. I prefer Sudhanshu.
One of the reasons why he (with 8/9 years experience and multiple decently well regarded books) is not spoken of more may be that he's from Bihar while Sahana (with an year behind her and hardly any publications) is from Bangalore. I know my batchmates find it hard to look beyond this factor that she speaks better than him.
I would like to see some names here beyond the NLU circuit and Jindal too. Other private universities like Symbiosis, KIIT, Amity, Azim Premji, and traditional universities like DU, GLC, etc. I am sure that there are good faculty at many places, though the numbers would definitely vary. Of course, LI is mostly frequented by people from the NLUs, Jindal, so that might explain fewer names being suggested from other universities.
The early generation of JGLS faculty were the best. I have also heard people from NLUs say the same thing for their colleges. I don't know if it's nostalgia or whether the older generation of a new law school has more dedication (both profs and students). Some names I remember are Shiv Swaminathan, Rehan Abeyratne, James Nedumpara, Nemika Jha, Arpan Banerjee, Amit Bindal, Neha Tayshete, Gudmundur Eriksson, Dipika Jain, Vik Kanwar, etc. Each had their own unique styles and personalities, so it was a nice mix. I guess many of the new profs must also be good, but I worry if there is a dip in quality because the college is expanding.
Most of them are still there. In addition, Prof. Karan Latayan (Company and Competition), Prof. Prateek Bhattacharya (Company and Competition), Prof. Shilpi Bhattacharya (Competition), Prof. Arjya Majumdar (M&A and Securities) , Prof. Mansi Kumar (Commercial Contract Drafting), Prof. Manveen Singh (IPR), Prof. Sreejith (Air & Space Law), Prof. Alexander Fischer (Constitutional Law), Prof. Pritam Baruah (Constitutional Law and Jurisprudence) are some other great Profs. This list excludes the luminaries (Prof. Baxi, Prof. Chimni etc.) who are in a league of their own.
Lol this is the kind of nonsensical thinking that happens when students don’t see professors as real live people and not - resources/ liabilities on the ledger.
In NUJS the definition of a "good" professor these days is one who gives high grades and does not enforce strict discipline. So no one is mentioning the person who should be a the top.
None of the faculty of NUJS named above has got a reputation for being a lenient marker or lax disciplinarian. Quite the contrary, actually. You should do some basic homework before trolling. Your comment makes it clear that you are neither a student nor an alumnus of the institution.
Rangin Tripathy is a fabulous teacher - taught us constitution. One criticism was he wouldn’t cover all topics, but whatever he taught, he taught really well. Discussions in class were really engaging and it really made you think. Now he’s in Harvard on a Nehru- Fulbright Scholarship, but is able to conduct classes due to online platforms.
There are other teachers who try and make classes more engaging, but most students are not interested, so even the teachers stop trying after a point. Rangin was successful cos he was also a super strict teacher.
Someone has let us know that they have tried to put in a vote for "Pithawala and Daswani as the best professors at GLC". [The comment appeared to have been swallowed up or did not get posted due to network issues, no moderation was intended.]
ILS's faculty used to be good before. Dr. Nilima Bhadbade, Dr. Sita Bhatia, Dr. Jaya Sagade, Malegaonkar Sir, Ajit Kulkarni Sir were some of the good faculty members. We used to look forward to their lectures. Have no idea what the present situation is like.
Prof Nunes Prof Girish are the best and known beyond univ. Wonder how many Prof are known outside Gnlu for their subjects. Some new faculty are even best and does great than old faculties. New faculty are open for new ideas of our student community.
Professor Sohini Srivastava has been the most amazing professor. She has truly made online lectures our safe haven and has always come up with witty ideas to engage the class. In these challenging times, it is of utmost importance for the professor to come out of the traditional way of teaching, and create an interactive session. She has proved to ace at both traditional and online teaching platform.
Dr. Lakhwinder Singh = Really passionate about Consti Law.
Saurav Sarmah = Best Pol Sc. teacher (much better than the HoD though she's good in her own regard).
Sadly the latter two suffer due to a persistent academic culture at RGNUL which holds up lax teachers such as [...] and [...] who know little about their subjects, but give marks easily.
Also shootout to Siddharth Fuller who really bring Consti Law to life.
We had a pretty great teacher, Kumarjit Roy in my final year at NUJS in 2014. I had an elective on his class on Corp Finance. It was intense but also a complete change from what we were used to. The entire methodology of his course was different and kept everyone engaged. Easily the best teaching I saw and ranks right up with Saurabh B.'s Law and Impoverishment as courses that made me think.
Certain students and faculty conspired against him and put pressure on the interim admin to make him leave. He was also trying to stop financial irregularities in certain student activities. Kian, please get the confirmation from insiders before censoring this comment.
Good ones who remain at NUJS include Anirban Mazumder, Sandeepa Bhat, Lovely Dasgupta, Shameek Sen, Shouvik Guha, Faisal Fasih, Ruchira Goswami, Atul Alexander. Aman Gupta and Anuradha Roychowdhury among the recently joined.
I have also heard good things about Neha Pathakji at NALSAR and Daniel Mathew, Yogesh Pai and Anup Surendranath at NLUD. NLUD has also recruited a bunch of young people who seemed promising on the few times I have met them in conferences and seminars.
Who are the best profs teaching-wise at NLSIU, now that they have poached so many faculty from all over the place? Do the fancy degrees correspond to classroom performance?
The degrees don't. However, those who had a decent rep in teaching in other NLUs are doing well here too, regardless of their degrees. Like Saurabh Bhattacharjee for example. Love that man! Can't believe the VC hasn't made him permanent yet.
1. Raag Yadav stands out as one of the finest professors I've encountered thus far. His charm and wit, coupled with engaging hands-on experiences in his Legal Methods class, made a lasting impression. I recall assignments that taught us to navigate resources like Manupatra and SCC, comprehend judgments, utilize the library effectively, and even included sessions conducted within the library where we were instructed on research techniques.
2. Although not an NLS alum, Rahul Hemrajani was exceptional. His captivating engagement and eloquence left me in awe. In a trimester that included IP Law and Family Law, he sparked discussions on Jurisprudence and legal philosophy among students post-classes. Undoubtedly, a highly effective teacher.
3. Arul George Scaria, clearly an authority in IP Laws. While I found his teaching methodology somewhat dull, completing assignments under him was exceptionally beneficial. His influence has certainly cultivated a deep appreciation for IP Laws within me.
4. Mihir Naniwadekar, currently a practicing advocate in Mumbai, played a pivotal role in reigniting my passion for the law, (whoch I lost in my 1st year) for which I am forever grateful. Despite not being a professor, he conducted enjoyable mooting exercises and problem-solving sessions in class. Unfortunately he is not doing well in terms of his health.
DNLU - Praveen Kr. Tripathi. Hands down the best professor ever for literally every law but mostly for Civil, Investment, Securities, Competition and Economic Analysis of Laws. I think his modus operandi is the only modus operandi which should be followed for every subject. That guy has read sooooooooo much and it shows in his teaching. I leave every class of his feeling so motivated to study further. His grip on the concepts is rock solid. Best.
There have been a few young faculty hires with overseas LLMs recently - S. Ramesh, N. Salar. Can say that they put in effort and are more connected with the reality of students, teach well too. V Malik also.
JGLS poached A. Kumar, else she was great to have for private law.
1) Prof. Hota Agni Kumar, 'Corporations in Colonial India' (August 2018)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5HKVt_-6W0
2) Sudhanshu Kumar, 'History of Corporate Law in India' (August 2018)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsDXJI2r0qA
3) Prof. Amita Dhanda, 'The Construction of Exclusion in the Indian Constitution', 7th Constitution Day Lecture, Daksh Bangalore (November 2018)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_0pNgzlxAQ
4) Sidharth Chauhan, 'Political Obligations In A Public Health Emergency', NUJS Lecture Series (May 2020)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-UEhIonu_t8
5) Sidharth Chauhan, 'Interpreting Legal Materials in a Purposive Manner', Beyond CLC Webinar Series (January 2021)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tl-ZJYbfwrI
6) Jagteshwar Singh Sohi, 'Struggles for Environmental Justice' (June 2020)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAJN0lnKYQo
Arun, Satish and Chandra when they were here.
Contentious but I would add Sophy, Danny, and JSM. JSM has his problems for sure, but I remember a lot I learnt during his admin law course (same for Sophy). I think Amita Punj is pretty good but people may disagree. Maheshwar and Surya Prakash Mishra really know their stuff and can teach vv well, but I think they are just coasting. If they decide to bring in their A game, they would be top tier for sure. We have been blessed with some fantastic seminar courses, but I don't think its fair to add them here.
This one is gonna be super contentious, but I think Dr. P was also decent. Sure, [...], but he also tried to make his classes fun and ran the language lab for kids struggling with English. [...]
But if you managed to enjoy prof Dr p, good for you I guess.
Ranita Ma'am, Jagadeesh Sir, and Uday Ramakrishna Sir are brilliant academicians as well, however, they might need some work on their delivery and class engagement.
RK Singh
Girish Sir
Uday Sir
Nunes Sir
Mamta Maam
Same for CPC.
I also rate Sudhanshu and Sidharth for sticking around, especially now that even Jagteshwar has left. These three along with Manav, Ajey, Anshuman, and Surya (now being spoken of highly by NLUD folks) had all joined around the same time when we came to NALSAR. We were lucky to study from all of them, sad to see only 3 remain now.
PS: There is some difference between abusing and intellectual/academic comment.
PS-2: Neither is (university) education value-neutral nor is it supposed to be.
As a community, we really need to have more people taking corp courses. We cannot continue to ignore it in the academia.
One of the reasons why he (with 8/9 years experience and multiple decently well regarded books) is not spoken of more may be that he's from Bihar while Sahana (with an year behind her and hardly any publications) is from Bangalore. I know my batchmates find it hard to look beyond this factor that she speaks better than him.
WE LOVE YOU
There are other teachers who try and make classes more engaging, but most students are not interested, so even the teachers stop trying after a point. Rangin was successful cos he was also a super strict teacher.
[The comment appeared to have been swallowed up or did not get posted due to network issues, no moderation was intended.]
Dr. Manoj = CPC God
Dr. Lakhwinder Singh = Really passionate about Consti Law.
Saurav Sarmah = Best Pol Sc. teacher (much better than the HoD though she's good in her own regard).
Sadly the latter two suffer due to a persistent academic culture at RGNUL which holds up lax teachers such as [...] and [...] who know little about their subjects, but give marks easily.
Also shootout to Siddharth Fuller who really bring Consti Law to life.
Kian, please get the confirmation from insiders before censoring this comment.
I have also heard good things about Neha Pathakji at NALSAR and Daniel Mathew, Yogesh Pai and Anup Surendranath at NLUD. NLUD has also recruited a bunch of young people who seemed promising on the few times I have met them in conferences and seminars.
1. Raag Yadav stands out as one of the finest professors I've encountered thus far. His charm and wit, coupled with engaging hands-on experiences in his Legal Methods class, made a lasting impression. I recall assignments that taught us to navigate resources like Manupatra and SCC, comprehend judgments, utilize the library effectively, and even included sessions conducted within the library where we were instructed on research techniques.
2. Although not an NLS alum, Rahul Hemrajani was exceptional. His captivating engagement and eloquence left me in awe. In a trimester that included IP Law and Family Law, he sparked discussions on Jurisprudence and legal philosophy among students post-classes. Undoubtedly, a highly effective teacher.
3. Arul George Scaria, clearly an authority in IP Laws. While I found his teaching methodology somewhat dull, completing assignments under him was exceptionally beneficial. His influence has certainly cultivated a deep appreciation for IP Laws within me.
4. Mihir Naniwadekar, currently a practicing advocate in Mumbai, played a pivotal role in reigniting my passion for the law, (whoch I lost in my 1st year) for which I am forever grateful. Despite not being a professor, he conducted enjoyable mooting exercises and problem-solving sessions in class. Unfortunately he is not doing well in terms of his health.
5. Mrinal Satish: Need I say more?