Hey,

First of all, the fact that you asked this question and you have this worry ensures that you have won half the battle. Here are my two cents to get you all the way there.

1) The loud folks in your batch, who answer in class, hold seemingly intellectual discussions about world and Indian politics, sociology and other abstract concepts, may or MAY NOT know what they are talking about. Given you also do not know much (which is absolutely okay) you can never call them on their BS. Take it from someone who initially found it very hard to fit in, and eventually ended up doing just fine, most of these people are just some uber confident, english speaking Tier-I city kids who rarely know what they are talking. So, don't get into any inferiority complex.

2) Start reading. Anything and everything. Read the newspaper. FT/ET/Mint (app)/Ken/ Indian Express. Follow smart pages on your social media. And read because you want to know more about how this world works, not because you want to sound smart in front of your batchmates. Once you have gained a baseline knowledge and ability to form an opinion (I would give it 6 months), people around you will automatically know that you know your shit. Your perspective on who the guys in your batch will also radically change.

3) In terms of publications, start small. Read something in the newspaper that is related to law, go ahead and write a 1000 words summary piece on it. Try to have an opinion in your writing, but don't stop yourself from writing if you don't have an opinion. Write summary pieces. Explain amendments and analyze their impacts. Start sending them to easier publications such as Indiacorplaw, or some of the new age student run publications. Once you have 3-4 of those, you will have the confidence to take up larger projects and publish at more reputed places. It is all about starting somewhere. Once you do, sky is the limit.

4) Indulge in non-academic activities. I cannot emphasize enough on the importance of having an all round personality for you to be able to feel the confidence in law school and life in general. Please go out with your friends every chance you get. Play some sports with intensity and form bonds with your teammates. Fall in love. Party and party like you mean it. Once you start enjoying non-academic parts of law-school, you ensure that you will not run out of fuel in trying to do better on the academic front.

5) Try to do well with your grades, but don't fret too much if you can't get them up. I was in the bottom 20% of my batch at a top tier NLU, and all day zero law firms made me an offer. I am not saying that grades don't matter, life is certainly easier with better grades, but know for a fact that what is worse than low grades is low grades with low confidence. So, if you can't get your grades up, keep writing, participate in moots, ADR competitions, play sports. Essentially keep yourself busy and have faith that your grades are not a true reflection of your abilities in life. You will end up just fine.

Start with reading newspaper in hard copy not soft. Start with The Telegraph (though it's left leaning, the content and presentation is good and can be easily imbibed of you could avoid the left bias. You may not like reading it at the beginning, but grit your teeth and force yourself for 3-4 weeks. Do focus on the editorial page. You will start enjoying it after around a month. Once you are really into it, subscribe to the Hindu and TOI atop Indian Express. There will be editorials on similar topics within a window of 3-4 days in all the newspapers. Try comparing the different point of views and develop your own thinking process. Write it down. This process has to be done in isolation, away from crowd, silently. If you could do this for 6-7 months continuously, your understanding and writing skill will be much advanced than your peers.
Also, though you are in first year, start reading jurisprudence. You can start with Fuller's law and morality. Then go to HLA Hart and then other nuanced/narrow topics. Don't restrict your reading to a particular line of jurisprudence, read widely. This will train your mind subtly and your comprehension abilities would have developed tremendously by 3rd/4th year.
Training demands time and perseverance.