Spot on. One of the main reasons why the NLU demographic has shifted from elites to the masses is because of reservation. With that, comes a shift in aesthetics and cultural preferences as well.

One point though. You say that this has created an “artificial majority” and shifted trends “mostly for the worse.” But the masses wouldn’t see it that way. They would argue that it is a true majority reflecting the realities of India. More people in India speak in Hindi than English, consume Bhojpuri pop songs than The Strokes and Radiohead, or even Beyoncé and Billie Eilish.

So the masses would say that the older NLU demographic was an “artificial majority”.

This post about cultural shifts in IITs very relevant to NLUs today. As the guy says, shift from a Westernised cultural universe earlier to a more desi universe today.

https://x.com/shrutammegopaya/status/2102439897726677349

It's simple. In the previous generations, the purchasing, aspirational class was an anglicised elite confined to metro cities. Now, the masses rule. NLSIU would never name a festival today as Strawberry Fields. It would probably be called Bindaas Masti or something liek that.

The anglicised elite now mostly live abroad. Those living in India send their children to Ashoka and Jindal.

it was choice to learn about western culture - not a mandate even if you were rich and elite. Of course, access varied. Internet made western music movies and books available once we had broadband - say by 2005

After that it was not about elite access, it was about having a curious mind to learn about a different culture

In the 2000s, the fees was around 1 to 2 lakhs a year. From that perspective, it's broadly in line with inflationary trends. The main problem is that inflation impact is higher because of lower purchasing power of the rupee and extortionate direct and indirect taxes that we pay.

"I have never even heard of any of these..."

"I have grown up on bollywood, tollywood films and on bollywood music"

That line sums up both OP's point and yours. India vs Bharat. NLSIU version 1 had students from an elite 1% of India, NLSIU version 2 has students from the mass 99% of Bharat.

20 years ago parents didn't want their kids to study law. They were pushing them to engineering and medical. NLSIU was originally meant to create litigators who are not paid that well. NLU fees realigned to commercial firm salaries since that's where most grads go now. People take loans in anticipation of the salary; they are not always rich, but yes, post-liberalization, more people do have money.

What is interesting of course, is that the fees/cost of attending have gone up dramatically in the last 30 years - I don't recall the exact figures, but the current fees are what? Maybe 20x the 1990s fees? I don't think inflation has increased by that much in 30 years (of course, the earning power and starting salaries commanded by an NLSIU degree have also increased dramatically in that time which is why people are happy to pay the fees).

Which suggests that the older batches were actually less elite compared to the current batches. There were certainly several people in my (old) batch whose families couldn't afford even the lower rates of those days and had loans or university support etc (most of them have since done very well for themselves and are financially very comfortable).

Why this sort of elitist lutyens romanticism is this

The problem isn't that they liked The Eagles, Ishiguro or The Manchurian Candidate ( I have never even heard of any of these other than ishiguro) Like whatever you want. The problem is treating familiarity with those things as evidence of some superior intellectual/cultural environment, while casually presenting Bollywood, Punjabi hip-hop, K-pop etc. as the stuff that “wasn't there" while also weirdly looking down on them

And honestly, why is “Gautam Bhatia reviewed George RR Martin!! ” being presented like some civilisation-defining intellectual achievement? At least Modi vs Rahul, reservation, Israel-Palestine etc, CJP are consequential political questions affecting millions of people and it should be discussed , if u are an Indian . You can criticise the quality of those debates, obviously, but discussing them isn't inherently less sophisticated than arguing about Game of Thrones or whatever the current epitome of sophisticated TV viewing experience is.

There’s also a weird superior hierarchy underneath the comment: Western literature + Western music + Western cinema = cultured/elite; Indian popular culture = conspicuously absent; contemporary political conflicts = culture-war noise, and dehati low quality ( I have grown up on bollywood, tollywood films and on bollywood music)

That's precisely the mentality that should be dissected more

You don't have to like Bollywood or Punjabi music. You don't have to like Modi vs Rahul debates. But if the blatant absence and disregard of Indian mass culture is evidence that a student magazine was elite and sophisticated and the presence of Western cultural references is evidence that it was intellectually superior, then you're basically reproducing the same elite cultural hierarchy you're supposedly just observing. God how will u try to relate to the greater population of India by discussing about these great cultural icons of the West , the same reason bjp is still chosen by most is because the Congress became this vassal of elitists with Western taste and western ideas ( which even though more secular and modern) just does not resonate with the masses

Being cosmopolitan is great. Treating Western cultural capital as inherently more sophisticated is not cosmopolitanism; it's just another form of cultural snobbery .

My thoughts:

1. Excellent and well-thought articles, poems and reviews. The students really made an effort. Even making a crossword. No ChatGPT back then, so they must have made the crossword manually. Wow!

2. Westernised and elite taste in books, films and music. Bands like the Eagles and the Who, classic films like the Manchurian Candidate and Trainspotting, authors like Kazuo Ishiguro. No discussion of Bollywood movies, Chetan Bhagat books, Punjabi hip hop, KPop etc. You can tell that the student profile then was quite elite (law aspirants were mostly from big cities and also less reservation those days)

3. Gautam Bhatia frikkin' reviewed George RR Martin!! 😮 These people knew about GoT back then!! Holy F!!

4. Someone wrote a poem called FUCK 377. Pretty progressive.

5. The one thing I found strongly missing are the political and culture war issues that preoccupy law students today: Modi v Rahul, Israel v Palestine, caste reservation, etc. Or maybe I just saw the wrong issues?

https://www.scribd.com/user/6383270/avyakto