While doing internship heard this (Informal Conversations) One partner (Millennial) at a law firm from NLS told -
"Back in the day NLS was elite, a small knit campus less than 60 to 80 students per batch. Everyone knew each other, every alumni cared about each other. Even till recently NLS was like that.
New VC Sudheer basically destroyed NLS as we know. What's the point of having 500 students in a batch. Even newer lower rung NLU's have far less number of students. If expansion is the goal, then it shouldn't stop - NLS should be like Jindal and increase the batchsize all the way to 1000 add some swanky swimming pools. What's the point of this expansion?
3 year LLB is a joke. NLU's were started to provide fully residential education to kids who were just out of school. Legendary course was just the 5 year llb with small batch size. Many came to NLS as LLM students but they were never acknowledged as real alumni. DU has a million students but is there any point of being an 'alumni' of DU - nobody knows anyone. NLS was always a family. Introducing 3 years LLB is stupid But diluting the legendary course by tripling the batch sizes is unforgivable.
Won't be surprised if NLS goes down if they keep on diluting it like this. Some years down the line NLS will just be like any other law schools with nothing special about it.
Don't forget the Karnataka domicile quota. Tbh, how long did people really think NLS could remain "exclusive"? High time that the place made way for the reality that is India.
This comparison is laughable. Harvard is also some 300 years older than NLSIU, is arguably the wealthiest university in the world, has extremely rigourous quality control on entrants and is located in a developed country where excellence, not mediocrity, is the norm. And the dignified job opportunities for Harvard JDs in the USA are infinitely more than what we have for law grads in India. 300 students will and already has largely eroded the brand value of NLS. If not for the fact that places like NUJS and NLUJ are also flailing and mediocre, NLS could even drop out of the top 3 in the future.
Rankings don't make everything. While both of those institutes are certainly excellent and deserve their rank, there are very few people who would choose to go to Yale or Stanford over Harvard if they managed to get admission into all of them.
Your comment shows that you are out of touch with reality. Yale consistently beats Harvard in law school rankings and student preferences. Yale is way more selective, and it's easier to get into Harvard than Yale.
Yale Law may provide a slightly better program comparatively, however honestly the difference isn't all that significant to choose Yale over Harvard in my opinion. Sure, Yale may be more selective with its admissions and hence may have a slightly higher student quality but the graduate outcomes from both institutes are excellent and easily comparable, to the point that having a larger batch size may prove to be more helpful in the long run as you have a larger alumni base to tap into with more connections and options available. This also works when you compare the two as Universities and not just their law programs, being a Harvard Grad opens a few more doors than what a Yale Grad may have access to. I'm not trying to put down Yale by any means but I'd still choose Harvard over Yale still even if rankings suggest otherwise.
Everyone who gets into Yale gets into Harvard. If you're good enough to know how to get in, you don't choose universities based on what is in the movies.
Yale admits around 250 jd students a year and Stanford around 350 . none of these top universities only admit less than 100 students for their first law degree course every year. Advanced degree courses like PhD and LLM are different. pretenting that 80 students a year is a sustainable or responsible model in a country much more populous than the US is ridiculous.
NLS is just like any other school. Wait for a few years and watch DU & JNU 5 year courses beat these state Universities. I can guarantee you the top 3 will be NLUD, DU & JNU.
3- Year LLB is not stupid, it's the market demand. Plenty of people are choosing to do law after graduation, why should they be deprived of quality education? Let them develop their own alumni base and own achievements. Just because one can afford to drop several years and then join a 5 year programme at 21-22, that doesn't mean everyone will be able to.
Newsflash: There is nothing special about NLS. It is a law school like others. It has got an excellent alumni base because of first mover advantage and gets the top CLAT rankers, that's all. Now it has got a decent set of faculty too. Even with 100-strong batches, other NLUs still have a small enough group to know each other. NLS got that reputation largely because of first mover advantage and a set of favourable circumstances in the initial years.
Sorry to disappoint the haters, but Sudhir's expansion plans will only make NLSIU stronger. The additional students will get the T1 job offers that would ordinarily have gone to other NLUs.
Also, OP can't be from NLSIU because he has spelt Sudheer wrongly in the subject line and comment text. Obviously a student of another NLU who is jealous of NLSIU.
Sudhir has increased the batch strength more than once in the last five years. So far, there is no data to support that NLS has been getting a better placement compared to NALSAR or NUJS. It didn't have any better placement even with a 70 strong batch over the last few years, let alone 300 strong batch.
Obviously you have no idea of how T1 firms recruitment work. They don't hire en masse from a single NLU, even if its NLS. Those additional students will not get jobs, those jobs will still go to the other NLUs. The expansion is only creating intense competition for a limited number of opportunities at NLS.
The purpose of a national law university is not to place everyone. The purpose of a government law university is to provide as many opportunities for quality education as possible. NLS is now doing it. We should support it - instead of gatekeeping the "exclusive club/family", we should celebrate that more people in the country are getting a better education. As long as NLS is able to attract good-to-excellent teachers, it's a good thing for the country (and the state)!
That the profession does not have enough vacancies is a problem of the profession, not the university.
"Back in the day NLS was elite, a small knit campus less than 60 to 80 students per batch. Everyone knew each other, every alumni cared about each other. Even till recently NLS was like that.
New VC Sudheer basically destroyed NLS as we know. What's the point of having 500 students in a batch. Even newer lower rung NLU's have far less number of students. If expansion is the goal, then it shouldn't stop - NLS should be like Jindal and increase the batchsize all the way to 1000 add some swanky swimming pools. What's the point of this expansion?
3 year LLB is a joke. NLU's were started to provide fully residential education to kids who were just out of school. Legendary course was just the 5 year llb with small batch size. Many came to NLS as LLM students but they were never acknowledged as real alumni. DU has a million students but is there any point of being an 'alumni' of DU - nobody knows anyone. NLS was always a family. Introducing 3 years LLB is stupid But diluting the legendary course by tripling the batch sizes is unforgivable.
Won't be surprised if NLS goes down if they keep on diluting it like this. Some years down the line NLS will just be like any other law schools with nothing special about it.
Their JD class of 2026 is 561 students. Source: https://hls.harvard.edu/jdadmissions/apply-to-harvard-law-school/jdapplicants/hls-profile-and-facts/
Newsflash: There is nothing special about NLS. It is a law school like others. It has got an excellent alumni base because of first mover advantage and gets the top CLAT rankers, that's all. Now it has got a decent set of faculty too. Even with 100-strong batches, other NLUs still have a small enough group to know each other. NLS got that reputation largely because of first mover advantage and a set of favourable circumstances in the initial years.
Also, OP can't be from NLSIU because he has spelt Sudheer wrongly in the subject line and comment text. Obviously a student of another NLU who is jealous of NLSIU.
That the profession does not have enough vacancies is a problem of the profession, not the university.