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When in 12th grade, they told areey 12th is turning point, score well. I did
In CLAT, I flunked and I thought PG me acha karlunga and settled with a shitty college with a grade ceiling.
No one told me that UG college is what actually mattered.
Ab kya jhand banega zindagi mera
1. Law firms and chambers require a lot of unlearning to do with respect to what is taught in colleges when you are into the actual practice and are expected to run the deal/matter.
2. Good grades might help filter out candidates at large but doesn't really guarantee a comparitive form of competence since experience is what really matters. As a PA, sometimes CVs come to us and we are asked to filter out candidates during quarter ends and what not; and I always make sure that I choose people with a balanced CV weighing more emphasis on publications and internships (then the GPA). Now this does not really mean the tier 1 firm internship candidates make the cut since its very easy to understand who is a nepo kids with 5 T1 internships in the third year or someone who built their niche towards a particular practice from the groundup - starting from boutiques and T2s.
3. Contrary to my take, ofcourse a simple batch rank/GPA let alone would help you get through an AZB or CAM; but without having a niche, I don't think your presence would bear fruit to the matter at hand. Further, while grades can be used as a tool to get the internship, a lot of toppers lack soft skills such as the ability to make conversation with the team or simply think through a problem which goes beyond the black letter law and requires astute clarity on a specialization. And the HR team cannot be blamed for such a sole filtering criterion because nobody really has the time to recognize talent these days.
4. My point being - build substance, focus towards a niche post your third year and guide your CV in that direction; without being forced into a team which you have no idea of during your campus drives (seen it happen many times with freshers who end up leaving in a month). And if you do not have the good grade, keep interning, networking, publishing good quality papers and winning moot courts. Be at it and do not ever look back or compare yourself with the batch rankers (who themselves are very clueless people more often than not) in your college. Focus on bagging a PPO with a tier 2/boutique firm centric to your preferred practice area post which you can lateral to tier 1s after 2-3 years.
5. Lastly, making it or not making it to a tier 1 firm fresh out of college does not really matter 10 years down the line since your expertise coupled with experience will be the only thing which shall matter. Personally, I am glad I did not take have the inflated grade by bootlicking the faculty and lateralled to the tier 1 (I'm overperforming ever since in haha) after 2 years.
My sincere apologies for this long reply but I hope you get the point. Best of luck!
1) LLM/ Academia- good grades get scholarships, they get admission into fancy places. They make life a lot easier. - it is technically possible to get an unfunded llm with bad grades- but theres no real reason to believe that that will improve phd/ jsd applications at all.
2) Corp firms- the easiest way to get into these firms is to go to t1 college and have really good grades. You dont need to do anything else or know anyone else if you have those two things. If you dont have those two things- you need to know someone, or you need to intern like a fiend and impress colleagues so much they over look your poor education, or you need to enter laterally after working at other institutions and building up your career.
3) litigation- one route to litigation in delhi is the clerkship route- clerkships lead to working with retired judges and lawyers and leads to a network of people working in various delhi courts. The other route is papa route- hopefully papa wont care about you failing tort law. the last route is joining a litigation firm/ chambers of established lawyers as a junior- slaving away for poverty wages for a few years. and then eventually making enough connections to start out on your own. Even once you start out on your own- pay is what you make so it is uncertain. Litigation chambers are a hard nut to crack- youll need to intern a lot. But just getting people chai during internships wont be enough. You will need to know the law and know how to construct arguments and know how to draft things. Or at least demonstrate the ability to pick these things up remarkably quickly. If you are that quick a study- and if you do know the law- i cannot quite imagine why you would have a very poor gpa in law school.
can we talk - seriouspen@mail.com
If you are willing - seriouspen@mail.com
I'm from a fairly well-known private law college and in my final year, but owing to chronic procrastination, mental health problems, and mild substance addiction with a touch of heartbreak, my grades by the end of 5 years were average. Not terrible at all, but just the run-of-the-mill grades one can expect from cruising through law school without actually putting in any real effort.
Getting a job through college placements doesn't seem like an option for me, since shortlisting is done solely on grades. I've done litigation internships and firm internships with firms well-known in the field I want to make a career in, and the feedback has been consistently good. However, despite this, along with a couple of Moot Court and ADR competitions, my CV is once again, pretty average.
So here is my question. I have made peace with the fact that I will have to start at a smaller firm, or a litigation chamber and then try making a shift to firms that pay well. At that time, will my average grades hold me back? Or do law school grades only matter to the extent of getting the job itself (And an LLM if required). Will this act as a roadblock throughout my life, or will a few years of work experience make up for it?