I have studied at one of those places. What law students in India demand - law students in other countries wouldnt dream of it. It would be unthinkable to demand that one is asked to read less for class or that one is allowed to cheat on exams or dictate what kind of examinations one will be required to take. It would be unthinkable to miss class without a very good excuse. Unthinkable to slag off any faculty member on a public website anonymously. It just isnt the done thing. Theres bare minimum professionalism that is expected from students. Law students in other countries dont demand that classes be rescheduled because they have other engagements, or that they be given leniency because theyre doing extra curriculars. You would get laughed out of the room if you asked for any of that.

How many pages a day did you read during grad school? How many classes did you miss? Go on and tell us.

Admin receptivity is about administrations- in the US atleast, the faculty member is the king inside the classroom and you can maybe have a discussion with admin about things like food in the dining halls or can the library hours be extended or can they fund an affinity group or whatever- but no one at HYS or Oxbridge is writing petitions to lower academic standards. It would be absolutely laughable.

Nobody is having it both ways. It isn't a magic cure to make bad students good ones - just the opposite: it throws them out of the park. The model that he is employing is a better 'nudge' in the right direction (success) than most other models - and the 'nudge' in the right direction is the key thing that a university is supposed to provide to students, in order to facilitate their learning, problem solving ability and skills, and overall growth.

I thought we were talking about workload models? That was what the debate on this part of the thread was about?

I will give you this: the student numbers increase was disappointingly planned. However, even there, as somebody has pointed out, you cannot have NLSIU remaining as an elite island like that if it is to grow meaningfully.

I have infact studied at one of the places named and briefly taught as a PhD scholar at another. I can vouch for the fact that the admin at both the places had been remarkably receptive to student feedback and quite accommodative insofar as genuine student problems were concerned. From what I'm aware of how things are happening within Law School currently, it's certainly not these models that are being followed.

I also wish to add to this that the fact that your colleagues in your cohort earning all manner of distinctions in various forms of legal career shows more about their individual drive, grit, hard work and determination, than it does about the influence of your faculty or admin.

what oppression? seriously you cannot just say stuff like that about not being given an extension or not being allowed to infinitely miss classes. Thats not oppression.

Universities across the world follow what youre describing as sudhirs way. As someone else pointed out- Harvard has the same policies that Sudhir is attempting to put in here. So maybe hes relying on evidence from other places?

what philosphy? hes a social psychologist. not a philosopher. He's written books that do go through an editorial process. Peer review isnt what you think of it. And hes answered questions about his methodology. I could ask questions about the methodology of any paper today- that doesnt discredit the paper itself. Many academic psychologists do take him seriously- not to mention the academic psychologists whose work he is citing and relying upon.

You can disagree with him- but ideally your disagreement should be based on thoughtful consideration. Why do you think his methodology is lacking? Why do you think his responses arent convincing?

Thats a far more interesting conversation to have than " oh well some other people have said some stuff so im gonna dismiss this guy". Its the internet- some other people will always have said some stuff.

And if we are talking about records, please show us a number of things: proof of your admission to the Oxford BCL, your transcript of results and your degree certificate for the BCL (showing your overall degree classification), your admission to the DPhil and proof of completion of your DPhil (ideally, degree certificate). For that matter, show us proof that you are/were a student at NLS at some point within the previous five years (and naturally, your transcript and degree certificate from there, if you have graduated). If you are unable to show us most (if not all) the proofs listed above, I think we can safely dismiss you as a troll; that doesn't mean you don't have the right to vomit up your bile, only that nobody need bother about you. If you can show the NLS proofs but not the Oxford ones, then, too, we can, will (and rightly should) dismiss you as a troll whose system is full of sour grapes. Again, you can yell from the rooftops all you like, but we will see no need to listen to you.

In the alternative, proofs of any other equally prestigious graduate study undertaken (Cambridge/LSE/UCL/KCL LLM + PhD, or American equivalents such as HLS/YLS LLM + SJD) will also be acceptable to Oxford ones.

There. I have explained the position as fully as I possibly can. I hope this is helpful.

Wow!! Questions about Sudhir's record now, eh? Best graduating student from NLS; a first in the BCL (nothing else would allow for admission to the DPhil at Oxford); fantastic academic connections in India and beyond; a list of publications which starts with an OUP book, but otherwise may not be as long or as fancy as some of us may have wished; loads of scholars who, in their writings, in their own names, have gone on the public record to thank Sudhir. I think that that record speaks for itself.

PS: As for the scandalous accusation, it doesn't deserve a response, but as I am back here, might as well give it one. I am not a current student of Sudhir, if that's what you think. And if he knew I was defending him, considering the circumstances, I think he would be very surprised indeed.

If he could make cogent and convincing arguments, then he could have convinced the students about his perspective. As for myself, if I'm clearing all my exams and getting good grades under Sudhir's regime, and still being unable to frame arguments deemed acceptable by you, then you should blame the regime.

Read my initial comment - I clearly state “ this is not all your fault, it’s part of downstream effects of social media use”. I literally said it - it’s not my fault you cannot read.

What makes it more palatable to you is you don’t feel blamed when it’s phrased as companies doing something . But the honest fact is that it’s both companies and young people who refuse to listen to scientists and researchers and their parents and professors who might know better because their insta friends tell them how virtuous they are.

It’s like smoking. Yes tobacco companies did a lot to attract younger and younger people to cigarettes. But also if you’re coughing constantly and fatigued and you’re puking blood and your wife and kids hate it -maybe you should’ve known not to smoke three packs a day.

Instead of asking yourselves -“ why do I spend hours watching reels and have no attention span to read for class , why do I get so anxious when it comes to deadlines - what can I do to get better” - you’re trying to - on this thread - cancel the man who is bringing back some discipline to nls and trying to make sure you can be functional adults who are good lawyers. Because that is harder than spending your days spouting half learned garbage from social media and not actually working.

What makes a good argument is not how coddled your opponent might feel but how truthful and evidence based your claims are . Mine are truthful and evidence based - I’ve thought and read about this for some time.

I’m not freaking drafting some argument for a Supreme Court argument here. I wholly reject your condescension on that part- move on and go call someone else a nazi.

My argument hasn’t changed at all - the only reason you think it’s better is because you are accorded less agency and responsibility for your choices if you can just blame meta and insta instead of actually doing things to improve your situation. Learned helplessness through and through.

I hope you grow up one day to see how stupid you’ve been. But more than anything - I’m done talking with idiots about stuff we can all see. Go cancel your grandma for being a boomer.

Just because the words are changing doesn’t mean the argument is changing or the evidence is changing. Really just read Jon Haidt before you start calling people nazis. Social media companies are targeting young women to increase anxiety and insecurity. Pornography and video games are targeting young boys and keeping them from being motivated or having decent social skills. Young people across the world are falling for that because of the short term serotonin boost and not really thinking about whether the emotional fragility- anxiety and depression and learned helplessness is caused by all of this online behaviour and not because all adults are evil or because work is evil or capitalism is evil or their vice chancellor is evil.

Look mate, as somebody pointed out, you are shifting goalposts. I think you might have some refreshing to do on how to draft arguments, along with some more thinking on what constitutes a good argument. I really don't think the way you phrased your original comment was wise or responsible; if you reflect maturely, you will surely admit that (any inability on your part to not do that would be very saddening indeed). This is a better way to argue your point - not just that, a better point to make.

Wow! You definitely need to be taught something about asking/phrasing specific questions! Correct me if I am wrong, but isn't the ability to articulate a good question a key attribute of a minimally competent lawyer? Maybe, just maybe, you do have something to learn from Sudhir! My suggestion? Go find out!

You keep shifting goals ! This is getting stupid!

You asked if he had turned down jobs elsewhere to come back to India - yes he has. You say it’s about policies he’s making - when those policies are defended then it’s about his character . When his character is defended then it’s about policy. How does he bully you ? By being strict ? Imposing rigorous academic standards ? That’s just life mate. If your boss asks you to work on tight deadlines tomorrow will you think he’s being a bully?

I’m going to quit this conversation now because it literally is turning into an argument with a toddler.

Are you being serious ? Do you really think I’m a nazi because I think social media companies are making our young girls unhappy and anxious ? That their business model relies on young women being insecure and being focused on relationships and body image as opposed to their careers ? Are you seriously accusing me of being a nazi for that ? Hitler was a vegetarian so are all vegetarians evil then ? This is honestly disgusting and stupid.

The phrase 'exam technique' exists for a reason. There are exam hacks (perfectly legal/ethical tricks that don't involve cheating or brown envelopes or cutting out CCTV footage) which, if mastered, can help even an average student to be successful in a standardised test. We all know this. Therefore, not to belittle your achievement, but your passing of CLAT (even if it is with very good marks) isn't a lifelong certification of intelligence. You have to show us how well you can do in an environment where a one-size-fits-all technique or hack doesn't work, where techniques vary, or where you aren't (or can't be) spoonfed exam technique as a result of knowledge mattering as much as (if not more than) technique, because that's life, that's what learning is like. Now get off your high horse, put your head down and prove yourself. I know you can do it, and, in your heart, I think you do, too.

In case you haven't read about his career, he taught at Buckingham (I believe prior to his DPhil), Columbia (if I remember right, after he completed his DPhil) and his own postgrad uni, Oxford itself (if I am not wrong, during his DPhil). That, combined with his teaching experience at NLSIU immediately after completing the BCL and prior to Buckingham, would have been a good enough profile to have allowed him to have taken up the option of never coming back, never having to experience the bullying of students who think they can take any old liberty they like (FFS, setting off fireworks in his office at NUJS!) and him never having to give his family members 'the talk', warning them that there's some pretty ugly stuff about him online if they look him up, all of which is untrue and deeply malicious.

Which models are these ? Please explain ? Sudhir isn’t doing anything at nls that the best universities around the world haven’t done with success. It’s surprisingly not a novel idea to improve academic rigor among students and faculty.

How do you suppose we get evidence without making changes ? It’s like you want the doctor to prove you have a disease and give you medication without letting him test or examine you.

What you’re proposing is - we do nothing to make nls better because we cannot predict long term effects. That’s silly - that will stop innovation and lead to stagnation. If you stop growing in this economy - you will get left behind.

The argument is that you have got no evidence of the fact that Sudhir's model produces better lawyers. Until you do, demanding that people put blind faith in it is not only a bad argument, but fanaticism. Especially because other models have produced all the good scholars and practitioners all across the country in the past two decades and more.

Oh come on GNLU PR Society president, we have enough trouble as it is. We really don't need Ganloo trolling added to the mix, please. Your institution isn't, and shouldn't, be or thought of as a joke, but this constant promotion/validation in a very troll-like way is giving it that reputation. In the name of god, stop, and leave.

Social effects apply to all law schools. How different law schools are responding and their effects- it is honestly too early to tell. You will only probably be able to tell at the end of Sudhirs second term if even then. Universities are big ships and it takes a lot of time to turn one around.

The first few batches under Faizan Mustafa at NALSAR were fine. Graduates had good outcomes, even a Rhodes scholar, many going on to graduate schools, and many steadily climbing the corporate ladder. But the last few batches after FM has been at the helm for a while? Not the same thing at all.

Also, "everyone else is also bad at the law so lets not even try to get better" is not a compelling argument when youre talking about the best law school in the country.

Correlation between screen time and mental health is only one way of measuring that. Haidt explains this on twitter. Quoting him:
A review in Nature, by

@candice_odgers

, asserts that I have mistaken correlation for causation and that “there is no evidence that using these platforms is rewiring children’s brains or driving an epidemic of mental illness.” Both of these assertions are untrue. https://nature.com/articles/d41586-024-00902-2…@zachmrausch

and I have been collecting the published studies on both sides since 2019, organizing them, and making them available for public viewing and commenting, in multiple Google docs available here: https://anxiousgeneration.com/resources/collaborative-review-docs… In the “social media and mental health” doc, we currently list 22 experimental studies (16 of which found significant evidence of harm) and 9 quasi-experiments (8 of which found evidence of harm. Odgers cited only the 9th one.) We also examine the many meta-analyses and review papers. I lay out the evidence for causality (not just correlation) and walk the reader through the Google doc in this post at After Babel: https://afterbabel.com/p/social-media-mental-illness-epidemic… People really need to stop saying that the evidence is “just correlational.” Sure, there are a lot of correlational studies (79 in our Google doc, of which 64 found significant correlations with variables related to poor mental health.) But there are also many experiments supporting my claims of causation. I’ll write a post at http://Afterbabel.com in April responding more fully to the arguments of the skeptics (including Odgers). For now, I point interested readers to a post in which I laid out 6 problems with the way that the skeptics have conceptualized the debate: https://afterbabel.com/p/why-some-researchers-think-im-wrong… I just want to note two more problems with Odgers’ review. First: She says that I am offering a simplistic one-factor explanation: it’s social media! But I am not. My story is about two major factors (end of the play-based childhood, rise of the phone-based childhood), each of which has many components that bring a variety of harms to different children in different ways. My book is full of lists of causal pathways. There is no one causal pathway that, on its own, explains “the kind of large effects suggested by Haidt.” Yet when you add up all the different ways that the phone-based childhood is harming different kids, some of which we learned about in that Senate hearing on January 31, you end up with a lot of kids being harmed in many ways, and these many harms combined can easily explain the “large effects” even though most pathways affect only a subset of kids. Yet Odgers and the other skeptics focus intently on studies that operationalize social media in one crude way (total # of hours per day), and then correlate that number with some measure of anxiety, depression, or other mental ailment. When the correlations turn out to be around r = .15 for girls (which is actually a number we agree on, as I explain in the previous link), the skeptics conclude that this is not large enough--by itself--to explain the epidemic, so social media must be only a trivial contributor to the epidemic. This is an error caused by an overly narrow operationalization of a complex phenomenon: the radical transformation of daily life that happened for teens between 2010 and 2015. Only a sliver of the story is captured by the crude measure of “hours per day” on social media. The skeptics’ skepticism would be more compelling if they had an alternative explanation for the multi-national decline in mental health that happened in the early 2010s, but they do not. Odgers claims that the “real causes” of the crisis, from which my book “might distract us from effectively responding,” are the lingering effects of the 2008 Global Financial Crisis, which had lasting effects on “families in the bottom 20% of the income distribution,” who were “also growing up at the time of an opioid crisis, school shootings, and increasing unrest because of racial and sexual discrimination and violence.” I agree that those things are all bad for human development, but Odgers’ theory cannot explain why rates of anxiety and depression were generally flat in the 2000s and then suddenly shot upward roughly four years after the start of the Global Financial Crisis. Did life in America suddenly get that much worse during President Obama’s 2nd term, as the economy was steadily improving? Her theory also cannot explain why adolescent mental health collapsed in similar ways around the same time in Canada, the UK, Australia, and New Zealand, as Zach and I have shown: https://afterbabel.com/p/international-mental-illness-part-one… Nor can she explain why it also happened in the Nordic countries, which lack most of the social pathologies on Odgers’ list: https://afterbabel.com/p/international-mental-illness-part-two… Nor why it also happened in much of Western Europe: https://afterbabel.com/p/international-crisis-europe… Nor why suicide rates for Gen Z girls (but not alway boys) are at record levels across the Anglosphere: https://afterbabel.com/p/anglo-teen-suicide… I just can’t see a causal path by which America’s school shootings, lockdown drills, inequality, or racism caused girls in Australia to suddenly start self-harming or dying by suicide at the same time as American girls. In short: There is a great deal of evidence for my claims that something terrible is happening to teens in many countries, and that a major contributing factor is the sudden international arrival of the phone-based childhood. I lay out this evidence––with hundreds of footnotes––in chapters 1, 5, 6, and 7 of The Anxious Generation. I have also laid it out in many posts at http://AfterBabel.com. All along, Zach and I have “shown our work” in public Google Docs and Substack posts, and we have invited others to critique it. Zach has made supplemental files for every chapter in The Anxious Generation, which give links to the datasets and data points that he used to create the graphs in the book. We invite you to check our work: https://anxiousgeneration.com/resources/supplements-for-each-chapter… Our work has benefited from cordial, normal, academic debates with the skeptics. We will continue to welcome their critiques. But please, everyone, stop saying that the evidence is “just correlational."
Link:https://x.com/JonHaidt/status/1774571680511508601

I agree. the first day of university as a Rhodes scholar- you get invitations from big companies to parties which is their way of offering you fancy high paying jobs. Anyone who comes back to trawl in the muck of indian academia is by definition a patriot. You can still dislike sudhir for any number of reasons- but he is a patriot.

I don't know how this is a debate, but Sudhir indeed is a patriot, and, if I may quote Hagrid (I know references to J.K. Rowling are controversial in these times), "a thumpin' good'un". He chose to come back to a country which frankly isn't a fantastic environment for people like him (or for quite a lot of people, if we think about it), but he chose to. He made a deliberate choice, when the world was his oister, to come back to the toxicity, the trolling and other nonsense that was (and remains) the best the country can offer to its talented citizens.

It's mighty presumptuous of you to pass judgment on what others are arguing for, since you do not belong to the group who are arguing or the group before whom the arguments have been made. All your comments, identifiable owing to your cavalier approach to grammar, have been full of such presumptions and superciliousness. Maybe you should understand that you are nobody to judge what the right thing for a student is. In fact, by randomly accusing people of corruption, you have proven yourself not even a good human being, let alone a good lawyer. Hence your opinion counts for nothing in this matter.

empathy and kindness arent. but you all arent arguing for empathy and kindness. You all are weaponising empathy and kindness to actually get leniency and corruption.

Its not a sign of a good teacher if they care more about their popularity and their image than they do about doing the right thing for their students.

its got nothing to do with misogyny and everything to do with social science. its not even contestable anymore than with web 2.0 the boys have gravitated toward video games and pornography and the girls toward social media- and both have made young people incredibly unhappy. Go read Jonathan Haidt.

Why don't you read up about his career? While reading for his DPhil, he taught also in Oxford. Please find me students from that time (2005 - 2008) there who spoke out against him. He also taught at another UK uni for a couple of years, I believe - University of Buckingham. Again, find out which student(s) there have nothing better to do than troll a guy who is a genuinely good teacher. Finally, he also taught at Columbia for a while. Their recent antics not withstanding, I think you'd find it hard to find any Columbia Law School folks from that time who would repeatedly tell lies about him - a phenomenon limited to a few trolls at NLS and NUJS, whose behaviour will be one of the factors that contribute to the struggle for both those institutions to be the Oxfords, Buckinghams and Columbias of the future to be much more arduous.

Not really. Most other law schools have that system in place where more than one faculty teach the same batch. It's a simple case of scheduling the classes. The workload of any faculty can remain unchanged. Instead of taking say four classes with one section, they will take two classes with each of two sections. The same will be done by the other faculty. It's not really complicated. Even Sudhir doesn't have any problem with the logistics, he is however in principle opposed to the idea. I am not the person who commented above and I believe that it is a policy decision more than anything else. However, I also think that it is a matter for the administration to decide. Students may raise objections and then engage in a dialogue with the administration if this is what they want. Honestly, I don't think that most of the issues that students have with Sudhir and vice versa would remain if they engage in regular conversations with each other in good faith. Sudhir isn't illogical and nor are the other faculty, so not sure why this communication breakdown has happened.

I just wish to add to points articulated by people earlier. This is what a good university education is supposed to feel like, not just at times, but often. That's how you are hugely encouraged to push yourself to your limits, and beyond them, redefining your limits.

One of the most commonly-understood cultural things about the world's finest universities, like Oxford, is that even people who would have been the cream of the cream elsewhere struggle, and find it hard from time-to-time to keep their heads above water. NLSIU doesn't have the imposing spires or any of the other elements of Oxford's grand architecture, which, combined with hard work, can really sometimes be scary for lots of students and make them question themselves, but you have the same essentials that Oxford does (including Oxford-educated faculty). Embrace this feeling, put your head down and kick out even harder to make sure you are staying afloat; when you do come up outside, you will know you did something significant, and so will the rest of the world.

Regarding a point that was made about academic standards being lower before and yet people winning the Rhodes, it's not as black-and-white as some people think. One of the 2018 Rhodes scholars, Rahul Bajaj, who is blind, chose to study in his hometown of Nagpur, rather than going to an NLU, at a uni with some of the shittiest academic standards. As he himself says, while his accomplishments even in that shitty environment were significant on an absolute basis but also relatively, compared to other students in better environments, he found it easier to crack one of the key elements of a Rhodes application - top grades - because of what passed for academic standards at his uni. He has expressly said that if he'd gone to a better uni, the competition he would have had to face internally for Rhodes would have been much stiffer. You are getting the opportunity that really smart people like him (he won awards for his work in Oxford during the BCL and passed his MPhil Thesis with Distinction and No Corrections) would sacrifice arms and legs for. Instead of constantly complaining, make the most of that. You were given the opportunity because you were the cream of the cream elsewhere. This is your chance to show us that you are the cream of the cream among cream of creams from lots of places.

Best of luck; I look forward to hearing of your (i) achieving the Rhodes/some other equally significant scholarship/LLM admission with internal-to-specific-uni scholarship, in a few years' time; and (ii) after you have absolutely drouned yourself in significant work in commercial law in the next twenty years or so (minimum twelve hours a day of work + almost no weekends off), coming out with an equity partnership at Kirkland under your belt and a salary we dare not mention (at which time you will thank Sudhir on bended knee for what he put you through as a kid).

So someone who was raised in poverty is no longer poor if they dont do things you personally think are "empathetic"? Under your world view- if a dalit person doesnt believe in affirmative action say- would they cease to be dalits? if a woman doesnt believe in the patriarchy would she cease to be a woman?

To be clear- sudhir isnt using anything as his identity. Hes not built his career talking about his identity. He hasnt sought to tell a sob story in any interview he's done. People on here defending him on this point are bringing up whats true about his background ( that his family was indeed poor and uneducated) to point out that calling him an elitist assumes that poor people all must believe or think one kind of thing, and rich people all must believe in another thing and behave in another way. They dont. It turns out life is more complicated and human beings are more interesting and the truth is more elusive than that.

An identity generally isnt a card to be used to win arguments on internet- its about your lived experiences and how they might inform what you make of yourself and what choices you make.

People concerned about non teaching staff must first ask why they were improperly hired and whether or not it was a good thing for them to be properly hired.

Since we are doing literal comparisons, when have the students been hauled up before the court and told that they didn't know their own institutional rules? When have the students charged money from aspirants for holding a botched exam? When have they illegally sacked workers working for over two decades? When have they tried to charge alumni for a virtual convo?

What other institutions? He has been to two NLUs and both the places have had faculty and students speak out against him. APU doesn't count, since it never had a serious law programme with a sizable group of students anyway. Whenever he tries to dictate policy, he usually makes a hash of it.

A. The VC doesn't want to have a rational discussion, with him it's always been my way or highway.

B. Competent faculty is fine, but the thing that the students had asked for is that if two or more sections are being taught a subject, then the same faculty teaches the same module to all three and another can teach the other modules to all three and so on. That's the only fair thing, considering the large disparity between faculty quality and experience. However, the VC refuses to even consider that.

There is a recruiter comment right here. As you can't seem to be able to put in even the basic effort to try and read (which shows why it is right for Sudhir to be failing you), I have pasted the text of it below - use your browser's find/search on a webpage function for the purpose of finding the word 'dick' (not in quotes) if you want to make sure that someone has written the comment whose text is given right below this line of text:

Only students who are worried about jobs think that recruiters must be appeased and catered to like they are modern day kings. These people are professionals who are recruiting other professionals. If you made a schedule that worked for the university and for them there is no reason for them to be offended. Those of us who have been working for a while know this already. We know that flagellation and brown-nosing isnt what makes us hire from a university or hire particular candidates or not. Its what we have a requirement for, and how can we get reliable smart people who can do the job we need them to.

Sudhir didnt cooperate with all these crazy demands like condoning attendance for interviews- what happened? did firms walk out of your day zero? of course they didnt. because its not some dick measuring contest about who is the bigger boss. its just about scheduling and everyone getting their work done.

PS: You can see clearly that the writing style of the above-pasted comment's author is different from my own by observing the fact that the author of that comment has chosen (rightly in my view, to show how contemptible and silly this discussion is) to be less careful with her punctuation etc. than I have. This, I hope, should prove, even to someone of the meanest intelligence like you, that I didn't perform the original noble act (whose fruit is the text pasted above) of sacrificing my time to explain something that should be perfectly obvious to a bunch of obstinate mules like you who clearly don't want to understand.

Professionalising it (e.g., not massaging the backsides of recruiters by sacrificing academic standards, polishing the online profile of NLSIU by making the website, among other things, properly accessible to screen reader technology, unlike the Sarkari websites of other places, e.g. NUJS); introducing degree options (LLB degree courses of various lengths, like you see at many UK law schools); strengthening (again what the UK law schools call) the 'quality assurance frameworks/processes' (damn, what a distasteful-sounding phrase in this context, 'quality assurance'!) for marking and electives; hiring top-quality faculty; hosting world-renouned research events such as the Oxford HRH conference.

You just dislike Sudhir personally dude- thats your right- but its other peoples right to not find you credible at all. Hes been in other institutions with no one trying to hurt the guy. And even if someone is not your favorite faculty- vandalising their office and putting them in harms way is absolutely unacceptable. You keep trying to paint it as if it was a harmless prank- but I havent heard of anything being done like this to any other faculty in any other law school- it was not harmless, it was not innocent fun, it was dangerous and unacceptable. Grow the hell up.

PS: no one is saying NLS is being run by Harv or Ox- where does that even come from?

As far as one can see objectively- there has been more private/ alumni funding thats gotten done since sudhir took office than before. Regular and timely scribes should be a thing- but this is literally being raised here for the first time, as much as the university can do with its resources to help disabled students it should do. Has sudhir personally stood in the way of this happening?
Comparable faculty is a tough one. I've studied in oxbridge/HYS type university- there are sections there for the core law courses and some sections are taught by top names in the field and some are not- youre never going to have comparable. Theres only one Mark Lemley, one Sandra Fredman, One Laurence Tribe. Particularly because there just arent that many good indian law scholars who want to work in India. Some of them may have to be grown at NLS- that starts by hiring young faculty and mentoring and helping them grow. Maybe Pranav or Padmini or Sahana is the next Sidharth Chauhan or Aparna- you do have to wait and see. Sudhir has been hiring with urgency these last few years- but these things take time- he has poached a very good number of senior scholars from other law schools. What you can ask for is competent faculty. Are there faculty at nls who are failing to do their jobs and failing to do teach the materials properly? Are there faculty that cancel classes or are teaching subjects they know nothing about? If thats a concern- lets hear the specifics.

Delegation doesn't mean creating fiefdoms within university hierarchy. It means that officially incharge faculty will take most of the everyday decisions- but their decisions are still subject to scrutiny by the vice chancellor. If you can name a decision where sudhir has unfairly interfered then we can talk- but principally- hes the one thats blamed for everything under the sun- its only fair that he gets to decide what goes on then.

Moot funds is really tricky. Particularly because in the hierarchy of what the university is for- funding weeks long vacations for wealthy students who want to do international moots is low on the list. A good university should still be willing to explore ways in which to make moot funding possible- if only to make it possible for the poorer students to have these opportunities too- that might involve getting law firms or private corporations or alumni involved to some extent. Debate funding is honestly kind of ridiculous if its a national level debate- maybe for international level debates it might make some sense. In any case- back in my day universities had no funding for moots or debates and we just worked well in advance to secure funding by approaching law firms and alumni and private corporations. If you can do it for a festival or a party why not an actually good cause right?

In all of this- I would think a rational calm conversation with your vice chancellor is probably more productive than trying to drag his name through the mud online and resigning from being student body representatives and protesting. None of this is such a great injustice that calls asking him to quit are justified at all.

The university is growing and changing these last few years, there are a many balls to juggle and many things to prioritise. Perhaps you and I would come to different priorities than Sudhir and perhaps not- but that does not justify doing this to him.

Sudhir still does come out looking like a good admin to be honest- hes doing a lot to change and move the university forward- there will be growing pains and there will be disagreements. But NLS has not been at this exciting a place in terms of its growth since its finding.

What youre doing- essentially- is sweating the small stuff. If I go to a doctor, and I complain about coughing up blood , fainting, and skinning my knee. The doctor runs a series of tests checking me over for cancer , he comes up with a treatment plan, schedules me for chemo, tracks my progress, schedules an MRI and makes sure I didnt have a stroke and dont have diabetes and brings in specialists to diagnose and solve my problems. If while hes doing all of this I whinge about how hes ignoring my skinned knee and not giving me pain meds- most people would think thats ridiculous. They would think I was too emotionally overwhelmed by what was happening to me and so I was hyper focussing on minutia. They might even suspect that I didnt really want to be treated, I just wanted the medication.Yes a skinned knee is awful and painful- but the doctor needs to prioritise saving my life before he can think about medicating pain. Thats the circumstance Sudhir found himself in in 2019. And youre calling him a failure for honestly- pretty small issues in context of all that it takes to turn a university around.

coping and thriving are different things. And I really doubt the pandemic batches are even coping when its clear they came in with learning gaps. Five years ago no one was so incensed about their boss telling them shes disappointed in them that they had a public meltdown and tried to get her cancelled. Five years ago when I was interviewing people I didnt find candidates flubbing basic contract law questions. This is new.

you can be offended and huffy. But it is clear to most adults that there is more sensitivity and more fragility with young people. There are studies to show this. Its not all your fault- its part of the downstream effects of social media use among young women and the declining standards in school education.

You cannot in the same thread be arguing that Sudhir- by being who he is- by being a strict task master and not allowing free grades and free attendance and cheating is "causing harm" and at the same time argue that youre not being fragile. We all have bosses- we know that being held accountable for your work isnt causing harm- its just life.

I know what the current level of rigor is, I have taught at the university recently. It really isnt as bad as you make it out to be. Its- what 50 pages of reading for a subject every week? thats very easily doable.

exceptional people will be found in every scam university in this country. That doesnt mean we start off a race to the bottom.

There are olympic medal winners who didnt have access to equipment or proper training or anything- just the village around them putting in money to buy basic equipment. But if the country wants to dominate at the olympics the way that the US does- you need to invest money and time to spot talent, train athletes and bring about discipline across the board. Not doing that- actually wastes a lot of human potential and talent.

Every year maybe one or two toppers from 10-12 law schools apply to be rhodes scholars- im talking about serious applications that can get shortlisted. That number is really sad. It should be five times as much. Because there is that much talent among the law students across the country. Most people who can win those scholarships and can produce the kind of work are not incentivised to do so by a system that encourages mediocrity. they arent given the tools to even be in the running because law schools encourage short cuts and corruption in academic work, because weak administrators would rather hand out sops like free attendance and free marks than challenge their students to be better.

What sudhir is doing- that is going to make him unpopular in the short run, but its good for the country in the long run.

No, it didn't. Because the room was locked. Has that ever crossed your mind that the students would have checked that? As for causing trauma, someone not being allowed to sit for exams because of a death in the family deprived them of attendance does cause trauma, that of having to pay money for an exam that gets cancelled because of the admin's stupidity causes such trauma, that of being denied financial assistance from the university without any rules/norms causes such trauma. I can go on.

we've told you- bringing back academic rigor, more private funding, better faculty across the board, reviving defunct journals and research clusters and centres, more collaborative projects with governments and with other universities. setting out a vision for how the university can grow.

So when has sudhir put fire crackers in someones room to scare them out of the university? Its not about mental scarring or trauma. Its about comparing apples to apples and being realistic about what is and isnt harmful. Someone having a dour face or not being cheerful and agreeable or even being strict isnt realistically causing trauma. Someone threatening violence might put one off from going back to that workplace. He wasnt there when it was done- but he could have been. Has that ever crossed your mind?

Chauhan applied twice- in different application cycles. He was offered a job both times and he refused once. Sidharth Chauhan got the offer both times because any law school in the country would fall over themselves to offer him a job with all his experience and goodwill. SK personally has been waiting to give Chauhan a job for more than 8 years. He was offering him a job even when he was at APU- that doesnt mean anything inappropriate has been done here. Should Sidharth Chauhan have applied for a job when he was not going to take it? in hindsight probably no, probably another candidate would have been shortlisted if he hadnt edged them out of the pool. But it is still fully his right. I have applied for jobs I wasnt sure I was going to take up- everyone does this because you feel out whether youd be a good fit in the interview process. Should NLS have penalised him for applying and then rejecting the 22 offer? also no. These institutions need to look out for long term interests in hiring good faculty rather than petty hurt feelings over one application cycle not working out. No special accommodations have been made and no rules have been broken. This is just how hiring happens.

Moot funds, scholarships, regular and timely scribes for PWD students, comparable faculty teaching across sections, delegating ground level decisions to the faculty who are officially in charge of things, the list goes on. You have been purposefully ignoring those, because they make your narrative about Sudhir about an amazing admin collapse like a house of cards.

We had plenty of good faculty who did not try to be an ass, but genuinely helped the students with the their knowledge and guidance. Shamnad, Prabhash and many others. Sudhir would never feature in the list. As for NLSIU being run by Harvard or Oxford, that's the joke of the year and is the product of delusion of the Sudhir fans here.

How does it harm those interests? As somebody has previously said, flexibility in some matters is fine, but not in the ones that are being asked for here. Therefore, the ball is now in your court: prove/demonstrate how his decisions to make the curriculum more academically rigorous harms the institution and its interests.

Let us be clear about the question being asked: we all want NLSIU to be in the top rank of law schools, not just in the region, the country or in Asia, but in the entire world, alongside the likes of Oxbridge, LSE/UCL/KCL, Harvard, Yale, Stanford, NYU, ANU and NUS. If NLS can do that, it is not just NLS's success, it is India's success. The argument of the Sudhir defenders is that he is taking us closer to that goal. How would you and your strategies accomplish that and what would you do differently, making sure that you understand that your strategy must create a world where the top three law schools (in order) are Oxbridge/Harvard/Yale and NLSIU?

Other than the internet connection and failing drainage demands (and perhaps the questions about infra more broadly), I can't see anything legitimate in asking for blanket extending of deadlines, reduction of marking standards and lowering of expectations re. attending classes.

1. Two wrongs do not make a right, if he has caused trauma to NLS students. If you were part of the fireworks incident, you should be unfailingly apologetic.

2. Please, please, I beg you to tell me what harm he has done to his students at the uni he runs. As far as I can make out, you NUJS people had your heads too far up your arses to comprehend how valuable an asset you had, and so blew it. If he makes his uni run more like Harvard or Oxford, how is that a problem?

Does Sudhir's marking criteria for exams include "ability to draw false equivalences" and "ability to be an idiot (to put the foot in the mouth) in an attempt to be disingenuous"? If the exam marking criteria does include these, you would be top of the class.

Since when has this been brewing that ultimately led to the student representatives resigning? There are posters stating that there has been no accountability from the administration and VC for a while now. And the wifi discontinuation is the most immature and a terrible step from the officials. How did it go down to this position?

This, too, is inaccurate. NLSIU has been ranked no. 1 in NIRF Law rankings since 2017. That would mean that the previous VC led it to this for only two years. This is Sudhir's fifth year, meaning the ranking is part of his legacy, and he (both under his rule and before it, as a student and a teacher there) is part of the NLSIU legacy.

Whatever your views on this saga, it is now time to cool down the temperature of this discussion. The best way to do this, I think, seems to be to repost one of the old classics (as history will surely remember it) in the Legally India commentary on NLSIU/Sudhir: an adaptation of the Marc Antony 'Friends, Romans, Countrymen' speech for the circumstances. Read and enjoy. Mods, publish this fast to reduce the heat of this discussion, before somebody ruptures a blood vessel. To the writer of this adaptation, you are a hero (I am not the writer of the adaptation, merely a humble philistine).

Friends, alumni, fellow LI readers, lend me your ears;
I come to bury Empathy, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with Empathy. The noble Sudhir
Hath told you Empathy was fatal to academic standards:
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath Empathy answer’d it.
Here, under leave of Sudhir and the rest (administration)–
For Sudhir is an honourable man;
So are they all, all honourable men–
Come I to speak in Empathy’s funeral.
He was my friend, faithful and just to me:
But Sudhir says he was evil;
And Sudhir is an honorable man.
He hath provided concessions to the affected, students and faculty alike,
Which provided them a space to heal and rest:
Did this in Empathy seem evil?
When that the vulnerable have cried, Empathy hath wept:
Wickedness should be made of sterner stuff:
Yet Sudhir says he was evil;
And Sudhir is an honorable man.
You all did see in other administrations
Where concessions were given to those affected by the pandemic,
Did this lead to a fall in academic standards?: is this evil?
But academic rigor is a noble pursuit,
And Sudhir is an honorable man.
I speak not to disprove what Sudhir spoke,
But here I am to speak what I do know.
You all did love him once, not without cause:
What cause withholds you then, to mourn for him?
O judgment! thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men and administrations have lost their reason. Bear with me;
My heart is in the coffin there with Empathy,
And I must pause till it come back to me.

(With due apologies to Shakespeare) (but also with due appreciation to the writer of this)

https://www.legallyindia.com/convos/topic/170611-what-is-happening-at-nls-sudhir-krishnaswamy-open-house

What appeared to be a thread discussing a student protest and its elements have now become a thread full of anonymous ad hominem attacks against individuals. This is completely unacceptable. LI is going to get yet another notice this way and then feature another apology with prominence. This is not constructive criticism, but plain trolling and mud -slinging.

He had appeared for AP interviews at nls in 22 and got a time period of one year to join. At the end of the year he decided to stay at NALSAR. The post remained vacant, and was waisted. Another person could have got this job. He appeared for AP interviews in 23 again got selected and was given an unprecedented full year to join and he joined in June 24. Sk waited for 2 long years for him.

Going by some of the other threads on this site, most law students want jobs in corporate firms. Trust me, the kind of work that NLS makes you do is just a fraction of the pressure and deadlines you will encounter in real life while working in a firm. And as much as I hated it while I was a student, I will grudgingly admit that it has helped me manage pressure in my career.

You dont know anything about me and I dont know anything about you. Lets leave all that baseless personal stuff out. It would be safe to assume Ive been at NLS in various capacities however. You dont need validation or approval- you can be bullies who want to bully. But if you want to convince others some injustice has happened that merits forcing the VC to quit- you need to make a reasoned case that goes beyond feelings.

Students at other law schools arent actually geting a good education. The closest competitor to nls is nalsar? why dont you ask nalsar students some basic 1 L questions and figure out if they can answer them? why dont you ask them about the faculty exodus? Why dont you ask them how many real hours of teaching they get in a week and how many cancelled classes? If you want to be them- if you want to be Jindal- be my guest. Go. What anyone can tell you today is that the legal market is getting more and more competitive and if you refuse to get better you will get left behind.

Sudhir taught himself a lot of stuff when he was a student- but the faculty group back then was strong for a small university and rigorous work was demanded from students- who were a self driven lot. it was shortlived however, the institution has been in a nosedive standards wise the last couple of decades and sudhir is trying poor soul to turn things around.

Do you not want a better education? do you want to be mediocre?

this is such delusional conspiracy thinking. Do you really think Sudhir cares what students say on anonymous forums? Enough to tell people who work with him to go post on it? Hes far too dignified for all of that. People are defending him because they actually see what hes done and they have a (sometimes grudging) admiration for the man and its not nice to let someone get bullied online by an anonymous mob.

No one is ignoring you. We've heard what youve had to say, youve explained your concerns- people dont agree. Batch sizes need to increase. NLS cannot be this small elite island and continue to hire good professors and grow as an institution. Sudhir has brought on more private funding for research and for infra than any other VC before him. I dont see any random irrelevant new courses- public policy is a good programme. the LLB move, while unpopular with students, is a bet that will work out in the long term. Not giving you free attendance and dancing to the whims of recruiters doesnt mean that he wants his graduates to be jobless- it means his job is to prioritise academics and thats what hes doing.

Only students who are worried about jobs think that recruiters must be appeased and catered to like they are modern day kings. These people are professionals who are recruiting other professionals. If you made a schedule that worked for the university and for them there is no reason for them to be offended. Those of us who have been working for a while know this already. We know that flagellation and brown-nosing isnt what makes us hire from a university or hire particular candidates or not. Its what we have a requirement for, and how can we get reliable smart people who can do the job we need them to.

Sudhir didnt cooperate with all these crazy demands like condoning attendance for interviews- what happened? did firms walk out of your day zero? of course they didnt. because its not some dick measuring contest about who is the bigger boss. its just about scheduling and everyone getting their work done.

extreme stand point epistemology. "No one can tell me I'm wrong because no one else has lived my life" is not a convincing argument. Reasonable adults can see facts and decide what they make of it. Instead of just vaguely alleging there are facts that make you right- you would be better off actually telling us what those facts are or what information you have that outsiders dont.

Oh, you meant physically? Nobody tried to hurt Sudhir physically either. The firecracker had been set off in an empty room when he was not be there. Is he or his fans narrating the story otherwise to play the victim card? As for any mental scarring or trauma that may have been caused to him because of that, his antics have caused such thousandfold to many a student at NUJS and NLS both.

I am not going to even legitimise these comments with a detailed reply because clearly you guys are not from NLS - very evident from your replies. But if you think so many students are simply wrong and doing this because they can't cope or are "emotionally fragile", then honestly no argument in the world could convince you that may be there is a limit to how rigorous a degree should be.

PS - I am unsure you even know what the current level of rigour is lol.

No. I meant least prioritised. If you allow students to miss classes and skip coursework because they want to play sports, attend music festivals, do their extra curricular competitions, because they have a headache, they have a cold, they have the grumpies, because some recruiter wants interviews on his schedule- then youre essentially saying academics and coursework are the least prioritised activity on campus. You should learn to read.

You all are trying to drive the narrative relentlessly about it being Sudhir v. lazy students. While choosing to deliberately ignore the fact that the demands are also about his bad administrative decisions, including high handed behaviour that have got nothing to do with academics. Increased batch size, less funding for activities, scholarships, introduction of random new courses and diverting resources towards those, non cooperation with placement and so on. It's clear that he's out his own chamchas at work to hijack the thread.

youre not consumers. University doesnt exist to give you advantages on a platter. It exists to educate and it exists to ensure there are rigorous academic standards for students and researchers. If you can point to an exam that had unfair questions or a professor who didnt teach- then you can make the argument that the university is not doing its part. But if none of that is happening- if your kids are just failing because they didnt bother studying- no university or professor will take responsibility for that.

Which question in which test was unfair or out of syllabus ? which professor didnt do their job in teaching their students? If thats happening im more than happy to hear it and stand with you to ask for redress and accountability. If thats happening- your raja beta has to own his failure instead of blaming the system.

its not facist to think the sober experienced tested adult professional might know what theyre doing rather than hysterical teenagers who whinge about their mental health and demand ridiculous things and want to be babied. How has sudhir harmed you exactly? what is harm to you? Is it just deadlines and no cheating? is that really harm? what is the university for?

I'm sorry youre overwhelmed and emotionally fragile. There is a steep learning curve coming from school to university education. But it is doable. I know because people before you have done it and done it well. It wont do to expect standards to be lowered because "youre not machines". No one thinks youre machines- its just that people who have gone through the education system might have a better sense of what is doable and what is not. Take a breath- consider that no one is assigning work to first years that they dont think first years can do. Step away from social media. Clean your room, make a schedule, and stick to it.

If you do have chronic conditions there is a disability office that accomodates it the best they can- if it is entirely debilitating you should consider dropping out for a term- sorting it out- and coming back when youre ready to do university.

Nobody at NLS is setting assignments or term papers that are due within 6 days. Literally you know what rough deadlines are at the start of term because you see it in the course outline. If you only give yourself 6 days to do something- thats bad planning on your part. thats fine. but that is something you will have to try to get better at.

No. Sorry. There is a wide gulf between whats expected from school children and law school students. The learning curve is steep but it is doable. But not if you come into it with entitlement and expectation that you will be catered to and standards will be lowered like they are in the schooling system.

Getting a law degree isnt supposed to be as easy as getting your board certificates- theres a reason the board exams are easier every year and more and more kids get great marks every year- its not because theyre all geniuses- its because governments have an incentive to produce more high school graduates.

Clat isnt really a serious exam. Everyone who has spent any amount of time in law school can tell you that bragging about your clat score is cringy like bragging about your IQ or how much money your dad has. Its an entrance test and it tests for aptitude at a very basic level- but lets not go ahead and assume that doing well at clat automatically means youre a faultless perfect student/ law genius who doesnt need to apply himself.

how do you improve infra without money? paisa ped pe ugega kya? Only once you get fees can you improve infra. Yall dont know anything about how universities are build. You think Sudhir had good infra when NLS started? there was barely a building. He didnt complain because he was a consumer though- he started working to improve the institution. Shift your perspective.

There is a world of difference between school and university education. Most of the failure in first year comesfrom the inability of students (who are often quite young and lack guidance) to comprehend this difference.

Firts year students are often carried away by the freedom they have while liveinng on their own. They forget that discipline is also needed to be able to work in such circumstances. In school your parents and teachers would pull you up when you were slacking. In no university anywhere will anyone do that for you.

Please. Its just not true that students are working hard in a disciplined way and still failing to get reasonable accomodations. If your illness is debilitating you should either be hospitalised or take a term off and get well and come back to university ready to attack. Its a university its not a hospital.

I dont think NLS students are machines. I think nls students are just as capable as students at the best universities in the world and they can handle the work load that you lot are asked to handle. They do more than you lot do. Are they not human? what is this learned helplessness and constantly describing oneself as incapable and unwell? If youre having a mental breakdown over having to submit first year projects- you should reconsider law school.

Yes. Be like Rahul Bajaj (who unashamedly criticized Nagpur Uni in his own name to the media for years both before and after getting the Rhodes), like Shai Davidai, like the students at some of the UK unis who were critical of their institutions publicly, in their own name, unapologetically, on LinkedIn, tagging their unis' LinkedIn/Twitter/socials and VCs in their critical posts about the unis and their immature and childish responses to industrial action (strikes and Action Short of a Strike (ASOS)) by professors. Win the Rhodes, get into the Harvard/Yale/Stanford JD, get a TC and achieve an equity partnership at Kirkland and/or become a King's Council in England (any combination of one or more of these or other meaningful achievements is fine), then criticize the place all you want in a non-anonymous forum. In other words, establish some credibility and develop some balls.

You want to continue being addicted to the drug that is anonymous trolling and bitching and displaying of the basest ingratitude for an opportunity which thousands would cut off their right hands up to the shoulder for (spending five years at the country's best law school) on Legally India, that's your affair, not mine; after all, this is a free country, you (and I) are free agents and we all have a constitutional right to free speech as Indians. Just know this: Indians you may be; lawyers you may be; Law Schoolites you may be: but as Hasan Minhaj said about anti-affirmative action Asian lobby groups who protested that they wanted to be treated like all Americans, "You just happen to be the worst kind" of people in all the above categories.

lol. what nonsense no? of course he is- there proper review process to weed out scam courses. Theres better teachers, theres stricter marking, theres more work thats expected from students and plagiarism and such is actually taken somewhat seriously. Of course hes doing a lot to improve educational standards.

literally the comment i was responding to was fantasizing about how people with more power would be able to bully sudhir out. you cant keep changing your tune. Own your shit.

Its not equity or reason to give out free grades, free attendance, impose no rigour and basically put academics last in a university setting. I dont think sudhir is the one with the ego or the superiority complex.