A student from Jindal Global Law School (JGLS) Sonepat, who has requested anonymity, has contacted Legally India with a request to publish an open letter with some criticism of the administration. We have published the letter in full and asked the administration for a response, which is published in full below the letter.
I am a student at Jindal Global Law School and I hope that you could publish this write up about our law school that will give you some insight about the administration.
1) High Fees
Undoubtedly, JGLS is one of the most expensive law schools in India with a cumulative fee of Rs 7,25,000 for the upcoming batch. The administration justifies this exorbitant charge on the ground that we have some of the best faculties who need to be paid good salary. From a capitalist view point it makes sense if one is to accept such an argument, but the same argument cannot be obviously applied to the residence and dining charges.
Take for instance, the residence charges at Amity, Gurgaon which is actually located in Manesar, which is at a very good distance from Gurgaon to be modest. I do not wish to compare JGLS' residence fee with that of Amity Noida, as while real estate prices are comparable in Sonipat and Manesar, the same is not the case in Noida and Manesar/Sonipat and residence fee to a large extent is determinable by the location and real estate prices. Also, Manesar and Sonipat are similar in other aspects that both are located in middle of nowhere in wilderness of Haryana, though one must say that Amity Manesar is pretty close to Aravali range, a delight for those who are interested in trekking and mountaineering.
Now, coming to the actual data, Manesar campus has following fee:
- Residence Non A/c – 50000 pa (Inclusive of Laundry) – It doesn’t have an air conditioned campus, but coolers are allowed.
- Manesar, Residence A/c fee – Multiplying Non A/c fee by 1.8666666667 (which is the ratio of fee between A/c and Non A/c at Amity Noida campus) – Rs 93333 pa
- Manesar Dining Charges – 3,000 pm – On an average no law student stays for more than 9 months at the campus, though usually its only 8 months. So annual fee is Rs 3,000 x 9 = Rs 27,000
- So Manesar total fee = Rs 93,333 + Rs 27,000 = Rs 1,20,333
The initial fee at JGLS was even less than Rs 1,20,333 but it has seen a gradual increase of 10% every year and now it has reached a staggering amount of Rs 1,75,000 pa, only to be increased again next year. Potential students must take note that they might be promised that the increase in residence fee will only be once during their five year stay at the campus but this is not the case, if anybody tells you so ask them to give this in writing, an annual increase at 10% being compounded will be 1.6 times the original amount in the final year and those who are on an education loan will face difficulties. (Check this link to see last year fee) Having been to both Amity Manesar and JGLS, the campus are comparable (As a matter of opinion, I guess the classrooms at Manesar are in a better shape) and there is no reason to justify the annual fee hike. Since, Amity is a multidisciplinary university in real sense that they have students from all streams including sciences, they also have some other facilities that JGLS lacks.
However, what is more problematic is the fact that from 2 sharing rooms, JGLS has now shifted to a policy of 2 and 4 sharing rooms but the fee hike doesn’t seem to stop. When asked by the students the reason for the hike, administration comes up with dubious reasons such as that they have brought more vendors to the campus, these vendors pay rent to the university and are a source of revenue, it becomes difficult to understand as to how does an increase in number of vendors at campus can lead to increase in fee. Similarly, a tiny increase in water or electricity charge will be asserted as a ground for 10% hike in the total fee, there is simply no concept of a proportionate hike. To sum up, fee is being increased, student intake is being increased, but there is no proportionate increase in facilities for the student, but rather most of the facilities are now used by more students they can accommodate and no new facilities have been provided to justify the increase.
Coming to tuition fee, I accept that JGLS has way better faculty than most of the other law schools in the country. I, myself before joining JGLS attended a middle rung NLU for a couple of weeks, and there is not an iota of doubt that we have much better faculty. However, the fee is also disturbingly high and as a result expectations are higher. There have been instances where due to conflicts between administration and faculty have led to faculty resigning during the middle of term, for some batches, the new faculty never joined and administration, not having any back up asked people from admissions office to teach them. Similarly, some of the faculty who are consistently getting negative feedback for years are not removed.
This might also be due to the fact that appraisal policy at JGLS is such that even if you are the worse of the lot as long as you publish paper in reputed journal, your job is safe with a hefty bonus coming your way. While many of us advised are advised by the university to not focus on CV building but rather on learning, the university seems to ignore its advice and is less focused on good teaching experience but more focused on international university rankings which also take into consideration faculty publications of a university while determining its rank.
Even bigger problem is that the most of the faculty tends to leave after gaining couple of years of experience at the campus due to obnoxious policies of the administration. After having talks with several of the faculty I came to know that most of them are assured extensive academic freedom and a good lifestyle, but when they do join the university they are treated worse than students with sometimes being forced to attend useless conferences on weekends. Student – Faulty bonding outside campus is discouraged, and they are asked to take permission for the simplest of things. The repressive environment at JGLS does not leave much option to students as they are stuck here but most of the good faculties leave the university as soon as their bond is over. If one is to file an RTI he will find that attrition rate at JGLS is worse than many of the law firms and IT companies in India!
2) Repressive Policies
JGLS is one of the most repressive campus in India. Having been to various fest at various other law schools, I can say for a fact that no other law school has policies as repressive as JGLS. Students till their 3rd year are compelled to take a gate pass for which their parents are called, this may be justified on the ground that it is for security reasons but what is perplexing is that libraries at JGU are not available 24x7 and one cannot stay in the academic block if one wishes to do so till late night as all students are expected to be in their hostels by 12:00 AM. Similarly, one needs permission for everything, be it using his/her own classroom or be it putting up a tiny food stall or doing anything new that might make minimal or incidental use of university's infrastructure. The process to get permission is more difficult than getting things done at a governmental department, you have to send mails to student dean initiative, then to a faculty who is willing to be in-charge for whatever you intend to do, then to some administrative staff and so on. As a matter of fact, if you even want to mass mail to student community at large using university's mail system that is also censored and more often than not if it’s an urgent mail it will be approved hours later when it need to reach.
Kian, I hope you remember the story that you did of a professor trying to do a roast at JGU, while he was not allowed to conduct the roast as expected despite the VC's statement on your website that he is all in favor of freedom of speech […]
Updated with statement from former Jindal professor Abhishek Sudhir:
The JGU roast was conducted on March 12, 2014 in front of a student audience numbering more than 200. It was done as part of the World Kidney Week celebrations on campus and I did not seek the prior permission of the administration to conduct it. Nevertheless, I faced no consequences for conducting the Roast. My departure from the University had nothing to do with the Roast. Yes there were run-ins with the administration as I was quite vocal about several issues, but at the end of the day, the decision to part ways was mutual. I have moved on to bigger and better things- I have founded a startup (Sudhir Law Review) and continue to work for JGLS as an external consultant on the UGC E-Pathshala Project.
3) Infrastructure Crisis
This might be seen as first world issues by some people but when you have to face it every day after paying insane amount of money, you tend to be concerned about it. To put things into perspective, JGLS' first batch was of `70 students, the upcoming BALLB batch would be of 360 students! Also, there would be considerable increase in student body as whole due to new courses such as integrated BBA MBA Program, some new masters degrees in humanities, and an overall increase in other courses. However, we have the same gymnasium of the same size that was used by the first batch, and a common room (place to chill out by students) one fourth the original size. The dining hall has been considerably expanded but during peak hours I have observed that only those who had experience of traveling in Bombay’s locals are able to grab a chapati, rest simply accept defeat after waiting for several minutes. The space cramp in kitchen can be felt by the constantly deteriorating standards of hygiene with dead insects in food becoming a common sight. All this is still fine, the real problem is the lack of classrooms, since there has been an exponential increase in student intake, there are not sufficient classrooms to conduct classes as a result of which the first years will have to attend classes in a manner similar to that of DU. They will have a two hour class, then two hour break and then another class and so on. During the break another bunch of students will attend a class in the same classroom. This will effectively lead to classes being held till 7 or 8 in the evening and ruining the entire day, leaving little time for self-study. (Two hours intervals during classes can incentive only the rarest bunch of students to study, considering the fact that they another class to look forward to once break gets over) This will also prevent them from taking part into extracurricular that require long practice sessions. So much for being a global university.
All this is not to discount the fact that JGLS is good at many things, be it be the almost never ending talks by experts on almost anything and everything under the sun, or be it be an overall great set of professors, a vibrant community but there are things that need to be fixed and they can no longer be fixed by pleading with administration but the approach is to name and shame them and hopefully, administration will finally do something about it rather than simply denying everything which it has been doing consistently for some time.
Now comes the most important as to why I have written this post. Dear, law aspirants do not for even a moment think that such issues are confined to Jindal only but you will find similar issues in every law school (See articles on Lawctopus and Legally India regarding issues in other law schools such as NLSIU, NUJS, NALSAR, NLUJAA, GNLU, HNLU, RGNUL etc. etc.), the reason I write this post is that once you join the law school you have almost little or no say at all in decision making process of the administration, but before you join the law school, you can ask them to fix up at least some of these issues. But beware, all kind of assurances will be made to you during the time of admission, do not believe anything that is not given to you in writing by the administration, as it is the university's standard response to deny anything and everything that is not given in writing to the students.
You are my only hope to fix JGLS as our student council is an utter failure in this regard, University only listens to them on trivial issues such as laundry, clean water, etc. Things that one should expect to work reasonably well without needing the interference on part of student council, but when it comes to real policy issues, decisions are made without consulting them. Be it be the change of residence policy from 2 sharing to 3 and 4 sharing rooms, or the fee hike issue, or be it be the reduction in re-examination fee (Rs 5,000/-), councils have come and gone but none has been able to change anything about these bigger issues.
This is for my fellow Jindalites/Jiggles, if you think that this post will reduce your chances of getting placed, think hard and think again, do you really want to work at a place where you are ostracized for criticizing policies that adversely affect you, because that is the place you are looking forward to work at in case you think that recruiters will not hire bunch of law students who do not necessarily agree with the way their institute is being run.
Rebuttal by JGLS administration via registrar YSR Murthy
Anonymous complaint from a student | Response | |
1. | High Fees – Undoubtedly, JGLS is one of the most expensive law schools in India with a cumulative fee of Rs 7,25,000 for the upcoming batch. The administration justifies this exorbitant charge on the ground that we have some of the best faculties who need to be paid good salary. | This statement is inaccurate and does not reflect the true picture. For five year B.A. LLB programme, the programme fee is Rs. 5.5 Lakhs. If one wants quality education whether in a foreign country or in India, it will cost. JGU is very transparent. Its admission brochures explicitly state the costs involved. Its admission offer letters also mention the costs involved in a transparent manner. Any increases to these fees are also duly communicated to all concerned. JGU provides generous Scholarships and studentships to students to ensure that nobody is deprived of an opportunity to study at JGU just because the person cannot afford to study. JGU spent nearly Rs. 40 crores towards scholarships for students since its inception. It is not possible to attract outstanding faculty members unless they are paid well. |
2. | From a capitalist view point it makes sense if one is to accept such an argument, but the same argument cannot be obviously applied to the residence and dining charges. | This statement is inaccurate and does not reflect the true picture. JGU is a non-profit university. A sum of Rs. 1,75,000 per annum is the fee for the current year student on account of air-conditioned accommodation, food and laundry facilities. Several schools in Delhi and elsewhere charge over Rs. 2.25 lakhs for these facilities. JGU has not passed on full costs under these heads to students over the years but has subsidized these charges by absorbing a part of these costs. We have indeed subsidized every thing. Indian School of Business (ISB), a similarly situated institution in Hyderabad charges Rs. 28 lakhs per annum. JGU charges 4-5 times less than ISB because it is subsidized by the generosity and philanthropy of its Chancellor Mr. Naveen Jindal. Everything in JGU is subsidized for the students and we don’t receive any funding from the government and there are no other funds received from any other organization or institution and the only donor is the philanthropist Chancellor Naveen Jindal. The difference in fee structure between JGU and ISB is a very good comparison to bring home the point that JGU is subsidized. |
3 | Residence fee to a large extent is determinable by the location and real estate prices. | This has no bearing at all as it is construction of the campus is on the prime land acquired from open market through its own resources. In any case, this burden is not passed on to the students. The main expenditure is the air conditioned housing facility, air conditioned dining halls, air conditioned classrooms, air conditioned gym, air conditioned student common rooms. JGU spends a significant part of its resources on power back up and continuous availability of air conditioning even when regular power is not available. This means that much of the resources is spent on DG supply and power back up. Again all of this is not passed on to the students as we believe very strongly that high quality education should be accessible and hence, subsidized. |
4 | Reference to other institutions | JGU does not wish to comment on other institutions. Parents though they have had multiple options to choose from, preferred JGU, which published its fee schedule up front in a transparent manner. Transparency and complete disclosure are our deeply held values and we will never waver from them. It is also our policy not to comment on other institutions. It is for the people to judge the quality of the institutions. In the first year in 2009, there were around 150 LSAT takers and we admitted nearly 100 students. In the current year, there are over 4000 LSAT takers and we will admit 360 students. There is a doctrine in tort law called “Res ipsa loquitur” (latin), which means, “the thing speaks for itself”. JGU and JGLS will be judged on the basis of our contributions by the larger community of our distinguished alumni, students, faculty, educationists, lawyers, judges and others. It is not appropriate for us to talk about other universities and how we are different from them. |
5 | Potential students must take note that they might be promised that the increase in residence fee will only be once during their five year stay at the campus but this is not the case | This statement is inaccurate and does not reflect the true picture. JGU is founded on institutional values that deeply reflect our sense of commitment and dedication to institution building on the basis of honesty, integrity and rectitude. Everything that we do is fully transparent. Every letter of offer of admission, every admission brochure and all communications to parents and students have been fully transparent and are available for spot verification. Again, such kind of sweeping allegations with no basis cannot be responded in any other manner, except by saying that this is a blatant lie and it is unfortunate that blatant lies are being made. |
6. | To sum up, fee is being increased, student intake is being increased, but there is no proportionate increase in facilities for the student, but rather most of the facilities are now used by more students they can accommodate and no new facilities have been provided to justify the increase. | This statement is inaccurate and does not reflect the true picture. Campus facilities have increased multifold since 2009. I wonder whether this person is even our student or not. In 2009, we were operating out of a much smaller library. Today, we have a state of the art library facility incomparable to any law school in India. We had a much smaller moot court room. Now we have a full-fledged moot court with state of the art facilities. A few years ago, we never had so many student common rooms and now we not only have several student common rooms, a few of the student hostels also have a gym. In the current year, we are making more gyms and every student housing will now have its own Gym. This is in addition to a common Gym that we have near the academic block. A few years ago, we had a smaller common gym, but with increase of students, we significantly increased the facilities and have a larger gym with all kinds of facilities in it. In fact, the sports facilities in campus are incomparable to any Law School in India. We have state of the art tennis courts – all synthetic and flood lighted, volley ball courts, basketball courts, cricket field, night practice facilities for cricket, football field, badminton courts, table tennis, billiards etc. Believe it or not, our student common rooms have billiards tables. All these facilities have been increasing every year and we have increased the facilities significantly and much more than increases in the student capacity. In addition, we have built new dining halls and a food village which caters to different culinary tastes and preferences of our students. We have also established a comprehensive convenience store on campus that will ensure that students are able to buy all their day to day needs on campus. There is a salon as well. In addition to all of this, in the current academic year, a new non-vegetarian food village is being built on campus. Many infrastructural improvements in the hostels have been done. A music room for students has been created. IT facilities are being expanded significantly. The University has not only been continuously augmenting its existing infrastructure & facilities, but also adding new facilitates regularly. All our infrastructure, viz. Library, Gymnasium, Playgrounds, Common Rooms, Leisure facilities are kept at more than adequate levels as per norms, standards & regulatory requirements. 8 new smart classrooms have been added in the year 2014. These statements made by whomever concerned are made with a malafide intention to defame the JGU and JGLS. They are not only inaccurate, but also reflect downright dishonesty in the tone and the tenor in which they have made. In the normal course, anonymous and inaccurate statements of this kind should be trashed as not worthy of reaction. But given the fact that we have respect for the media and in particular, Legally India, we are giving the relevant facts for your knowledge. In fact, most of these statements are verifiable. Persons making irresponsible statements made with a malafide intention to defame should be made accountable. With freedom comes responsibility and people cannot shirk away from their responsibility. By making completely untrue statements, each of which can be easily verified on campus, this person has wasted the precious time of Legally India and the institution. We encourage the visit of Legally India correspondent to visit JGU and see facts on the ground. |
7 | Coming to tuition fee, I accept that JGLS has way better faculty than most of the other law schools in the country. I, myself before joining JGLS attended a middle rung NLU for a couple of weeks, and there is not an iota of doubt that we have much better faculty. However, the fee is also disturbingly high and as a result expectations are higher. | It is widely acknowledged that JGU has the best faculty. It is not possible to attract outstanding faculty members unless they are paid well. I don’t see why this contradictory statement is being made. This is obviously the reason for the fee, but we do not agree that our fee is high. In fact, the fee at JGU and JGLS is relatively low for what it is offering. We have subsidized the education for the students due to the philanthropy of our Chancellor Mr. Naveen Jindal. Again, it is important to note that a similarly situated institution, ISB Hyderabad (good infrastructure, air conditioned classrooms and housing, good faculty including international faculty) charges 4 to 5 times more than JGU. ISB charges approx. nearly Rs. 28 lakhs per annum. But we are able to charge 4 to 5 times less than ISB because of the generous and magnanimous philanthropic contribution of our Chancellor. |
8 | There have been instances where due to conflicts between administration and faculty have led to faculty resigning during the middle of term, for some batches, the new faculty never joined and administration, not having any back up asked people from admissions office to teach them. | This statement is inaccurate and does not reflect the true picture. It is a completely baseless statement. JGU does not engage in termination of its faculty members, as we believe that we need to nurture and mentor the outstanding faculty we hire in the first place. A few of them left for pursuing higher studies and other professional pursuits. All faculty members who teach at JGU have outstanding qualifications and experience. We always maintain a 1:15 faculty student ratio, perhaps the best in the country while the Bar Council of India’s requirement is 1:40. However, to tap the talent, expertise available within & outside the University, we engage specialists to further supplement our regular teaching resources. This statement made by the concerned person smacks of personal animosity, rather than anything accurate. All faculty members including those who have ever taught any course to our students either have the requisite qualifications or possess more than adequate qualification. We value our responsibilities to teaching very seriously. In fact, this is one of the reasons why in the first year of our founding, we introduced the Teaching Learning Feedback Questionnaire (TLFQ) which will enable the students themselves to assess the performance of each and every teacher. |
9 | Similarly, some of the faculty who are consistently getting negative feedback for years are not removed. This might also be due to the fact that appraisal policy at JGLS is such that even if you are the worse of the lot as long as you publish paper in reputed journal, your job is safe with a hefty bonus coming your way. | This statement is inaccurate and does not reflect the true picture. JGU carefully selects its faculty members and values each and every member selected. In fact our purpose to introduce TLFQ is to precisely give an opportunity for the student to assess the teacher’s classroom performance and the teacher to receive a feedback as to how the student perceive the teaching of the concerned faculty member. There is a very transparent faculty appraisal process as well as a faculty mentoring scheme. The TLFQs submitted by the teachers are carefully examined and a number of measures and steps are taken. The purpose of these schemes and processes are to ensure that we maintain the highest quality in our teaching and research. The point about research and publication is a ludicrous statement. Every good university should seek a sound balance between teaching and research. Both are important for promoting excellence. |
10 | Even bigger problem is that the most of the faculty tends to leave after gaining couple of years of experience at the campus due to obnoxious policies of the administration. After having talks with several of the faculty I came to know that most of them are assured extensive academic freedom and a good lifestyle, but when they do join the university they are treated worse than students with sometimes being forced to attend useless conferences on weekends. | This statement is inaccurate and does not reflect the true picture. It is absolutely incorrect and vague statement without reference to any names. Even a few faculty members who have left for higher studies or other professional pursuits have had good things to say about JGU’s policies. Current faculty members can vouch for their academic freedom and high quality intellectually-stimulating conferences. We have over 150 faculty members of which over 100 of them are in JGLS. There are over 20 international faculty members from around the world who are working at JGU. Our university recruits faculty members among the graduates of Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Brown, Columbia, JNU and many other great universities in India and around the world. Such silly and irresponsible statements are not worth commenting upon when you have the facts at your disposal that are contrary to these statements. Our university is deeply committed to ensuring academic freedom, intellectual liberty, and research excellence. One of the reasons for we continuing to attract the brightest individuals from India and around the world to be a faculty member at JGU is not only because of our competitive salaries, but are extremely generous and liberal policies for faculty members. We have staff development grants; research grants, research excellence awards, teaching excellence awards, summer and winter leave policies and many other attractive policies and schemes for the benefit of the faculty members. |
11 | Student – Faulty bonding outside campus is discouraged, and they are asked to take permission for the simplest of things. The repressive environment at JGLS does not leave much option to students as they are stuck here but most of the good faculties leave the university as soon as their bond is over. If one is to file an RTI he will find that attrition rate at JGLS is worse than many of the law firms and IT companies in India! | This statement is inaccurate and does not reflect the true picture. Student-faculty bonding is always encouraged and is cherished in JGU. JGU does not believe in repression. Far from attrition, JGU’s retention rate is an impressive success story. We continue to attract high caliber faculty members from across the world. These statements are made with no link to the facts in the ground. We have a fantastic faculty retention rate and that is because of how we treat our faculty members. All you need to do is to go to our website and see who our faculty members are. Professors who have spent their life time at Harvard and Stanford are teaching at Jindal. People with outstanding qualifications and experiences from around the world in the leading universities and law schools are teaching in a full time capacity with Jindal. These statements made by the concerned person are completely false and does not reflect the reality. They are made with a malafide intention to defame the institution. |
12 | Repressive Policies – JGLS is one of the most repressive campus in India. Having been to various fest at various other law schools, I can say for a fact that no other law school has policies as repressive as JGLS. Students till their 3rd year are compelled to take a gate pass for which their parents are called, this may be justified on the ground that it is for security reasons but what is perplexing is that libraries at JGU are not available 24x7 and one cannot stay in the academic block if one wishes to do so till late night as all students are expected to be in their hostels by 12:00 AM. Similarly, one needs permission for everything, be it using his/her own classroom or be it putting up a tiny food stall or doing anything new that might make minimal or incidental use of university's infrastructure. The process to get permission is more difficult than getting things done at a governmental department, you have to send mails to student dean initiative, then to a faculty who is willing to be in-charge for whatever you intend to do, then to some administrative staff and so on. | This statement is inaccurate and does not reflect the real picture. There is a gate pass policy which is published in the Student Handbook. Students can remain in the academic block till 1 am and are expected to be back in their hostels by 1 am. Everything is done as per Policy. Various approvals are given in a timely manner. The very fact that JGU funded and allowed the following activities is a testimony of its liberal policies: JGU annual sports fest, Magnus 2013, Magnus 2014, and Magnus 2015. JGU’s cultural fest, Biswamil 2014. Biswamil 2015; several editions of band music festival Xion, Cultural Night, Ethnic Night, Camus Theatre festival and Bollywood Night. This is a non-exhaustive list of many such activities supported by JGU administration throughout the year. |
13 | As a matter of fact, if you even want to mass mail to student community at large using university's mail system that is also censored and more often than not if it’s an urgent mail it will be approved hours later when it need to reach. | Mass mails are subject to Mail Moderation Policy and as per global practices in vogue. |
14 | JGLS is one of the most repressive campus in India. Having been to various fest at various other law schools, I can say for a fact that no other law school has policies as repressive as JGLS. Students till their 3rd year are compelled to take a gate pass for which their parents are called, this may be justified on the ground that it is for security reasons but what is perplexing is that libraries at JGU are not available 24x7 and one cannot stay in the academic block if one wishes to do so till late night | JGU’s policies are based, among others, on consultations with parents who are key stakeholders and seek to protect best interests of students. We take our policies and approaches relating to safety, security and wellbeing of the students very seriously. We will have to balance freedom and responsibility. JGU is a fully residential community. We owe it to the parents and students who have trusted us as an institution to ensure their safety and security. We recognize that we are a university and have created a free and liberal environment on campus, but all these freedoms have to be exercised within the limits set by the rules and regulations of the campus. |
15 | Kian, I hope you remember the story that you did of a professor trying to do a roast at JGU, while he was not allowed to conduct the roast as expected despite the VC's statement on your website that he is all in favor of freedom of speech […] | This statement is inaccurate and does not reflect the true picture and is completely false. Members of JGU community enjoy their freedom of speech. It may not be appropriate to comment on individual faculty members’ decision about joining or leaving JGU. All we can say is that these are personal decisions of the faculty members and it won’t be appropriate for us to comment on them. Updated with statement from former Jindal professor Abhishek Sudhir: “The JGU roast was conducted on March 12, 2014 in front of a student audience numbering more than 200. It was done as part of the World Kidney Week celebrations on campus and I did not seek the prior permission of the administration to conduct it. Nevertheless, I faced no consequences for conducting the Roast. My departure from the University had nothing to do with the Roast. Yes there were run-ins with the administration as I was quite vocal about several issues, but at the end of the day, the decision to part ways was mutual. I have moved on to bigger and better things- I have founded a startup (Sudhir Law Review) and continue to work for JGLS as an external consultant on the UGC E-Pathshala Project.” |
16 | However, we have the same gymnasium of the same size that was used by the first batch, and a common room (place to chill out by students) one fourth the original size. | We have already discussed this matter before. JGU has world class facilities that are unmatched in size and scope to any Law School in the whole of South Asia. Several facilities have been built over the years. Every year, we add new facilities. 2 new mini gyms are being created in hostels and will be ready in the course of next 4 weeks. A food village has been created besides a music room. One more non-veg food village is expected to be operational by mid-July 2015. There is a continuous improvement of physical infrastructure. (See also response at Sr. No. 6 above) |
17 | Lack of classrooms | There are over 40 class rooms and they take care of current and future requirements. |
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Please do a story on exorbitant fees charged at NALSAR and the cross subsidization of MBA from BALLB course.
What I hear from faculty members is that it is going to be 100% non residential course.
I guess Rest in peace concept of dedicated Universities for 5 year Law course.
P.S. this one is for those who disliked :p
Note: I am not speaking only from my experience but on behalf of all those silent recluses. And though this college has taught me a lot but that doesn't beat the fact that it's a shitty place full of shitty people.
P.S. eagerly waiting for you to succeed where I failed. :)
Seriously, kids- you have a wash and dry laundry service, on call housekeeping, food delivered to your room when you are sick, acceptable medical facilities, 24/7 AC, massive storage space in your rooms, lush green expanses which are regularly maintained and manicured, an orgasmic library and reading room, mind boggingly crazy sports facilities and trainers, campus radio, staff for EVERYTHING (you never have to raise a finger), daily campus maintenance (you don't even dispose your own trash or plates), balconies and in some cases attached bathrooms etc.
Even food has become better I hear- you get four meals a days with a wide variety of 7-8 elements/dishes per meal (including packaged juice, milk three ways, toast freshly toasted etc), which is served to you by 4 servers at a time in a HUGE kitchen (I have taken a tour of it) by underpaid and mistreated staff. You have state of the art security services and the electricity consumption is massive due to the campus being excessively well lit so that the darkness doesn't engulf you in the middle of nowhere.
Your faculty is the who's-who of Indian legal academia as well foreign legal academia, you have excellent library and database services, your faculty is so well acclaimed that they have to be paid roughly between 8-10 lakhs p.a. (RA's) to 1-2 crores (maybe more), and therefore a chunk of your fees (5-6 lakhs p.a.) has to go into their salaries. You go to a wide variety of institutions for exchange programmes as well as summer schools, which are heavily subsidised for you. Your faculty is also sent to events through the year, all of which costs money. The multiple conferences by excellent guests that are organised through the year are also for your learning and benefit but unfortunately these too go unattended.
Your classrooms are state of the art- your projector, automated screens and lights are controlled using iPad;s, in some cases laptops, classrooms are big and airy with multiple plug points. To say that the classrooms are well equipped would be an understatement. They are also well- maintained but over the years may have been subjected to some damage, because you know, students are SO damn rowdy. THIS IS WHY YOU CAN'T HAVE NICE THINGS!
This is just the tip of the iceberg guys, I cannot even elucidate on the campus and sports facilities, especially the latter since I never used them.
You have the guts to write this long email which makes you look like a privileged whiner but don't have the guts to admit that a lot of the policies are in the form they are today, because of YOU. Trace the history of curfews, security, gate pass policies through the years- right from 2009 to present day. Then trace the history of vandalism, misbehaviour, road accidents, drunken misdemeanours, drug heists (pot is okay but if you are dropping acid, E, MDMA, doing coke regularly on campus, then please don't blame the administration for being scared out of their wits), beating up guards, verbal abuse of guards, stealing University property, fights on campus, ragging, injuries, multiple student deaths, poor attendance and academic records, disrespect to faculty….RAPE etc. Also add to this your inability to dispose trash, be kind to your peers, faculty, vendors and University staff, look after University property, show any gratitude or generally RAISE A FINGER. Compare the two sets of data and map the correlations. Please let me know your conclusion.
Apart from a small percentage of students actively involved in co-curriculars, academics and forming policies, the rest are sitting on their asses binge watching tv shows and eating up into campus broadband while getting stoned and eating at Gulab.
Please collectively be responsible members of the University first before bringing all this up. Otherwise this just makes you look like privileged, spoilt rich bratty whiners- a reputation that you are doing NOTHING to blot out. I realised this a couple of years into my college life, before which I was also vocal in my criticism, but then I realised that the only way I can get the maximum of the University. my parent’s money and my time is by working on MYSELF.
I also don't think that this letter is intended to say JGLS is a bad institution or university, just that it has some issues, as most other colleges do.
Having a debate about them shouldn't really hurt the college, it should strengthen it.
His comparison with ISB is laughable. Different subjects, different locations, different course schedules, different work loads, different course lengths (1 yr versus 5 years), there;s no way he can compare it.
As for faculty, the truth is that while JGLS brochure presents many foreign faculty, many of them are letterhead faculty only and the bulk of teaching is by indians no better than those at other law schools. Most of them are too scared of the management of JGLS to speak out.
Many other inaccuracies but I cant waste time on those
Relax, I have former colleagues, batchmates and friends teaching there so it's quite an informed view.
The thing is that desis teach at JGLS only when they need money desperately (the salary is about double what the NLUs pay) or when they need a teaching job desperately. At the moment it is impossible to make a career in law teaching outside of the NLUs and that will be the case for many years to come. In addition, being a private university scope for dissent, discussion etc is severely limited and that takes a toll on them.
As for the foreigners, JGLS is to them either a temporary base in India where they get royal treatment, or a good CV builder for their own careers. None of them care to stay there for long or teach much but are quite happy at lending their names for the brochure.
The one thing that JGLS has going is the exchange program and that is better than anything the NLUs have.
Actually since the Registrar is so keen to compare Jiggles with ISB, why doesnt he compare the placements of ISB with Jindal ??
Students, please ask him this question next time you get a chance. Why not ISB -style placements.
I seriously doubt if you have the true picture of our faculty. Undoubtedly it is the best faculty you could get in any law school in INDIA. Please show me one college, including the top notch NLU's who have better faculty than us. And this is not just about being on paper, the student satisfaction that is present among the Jindalites speak volume. Please conduct any survey you wish and find this out.
One reply to all that you have been saying .which other college charges 7,25000 Pa? Are we getting the value of it ? NO !
Quite the scene at many law schools!
Registrar is just trying to defend as it's the admissions time.
40 class rooms - then why classes have been scheduled till 8 p.m.
Did he say music room he calls that tin box music room and the bigger tin box is called gym.
VC's response if you have so many problems then why don't you take your money and leave the university.
The problem is that it is a private university and students are afraid to go against the administration.
As their placements will be be affected.VC also uses the same reason to justify some of his actions.They are more afraid of University's VC than Narender Modi.
Philanthropist Chancellor Naveen Jindal that f**kr banned non vegetarian food on campus.
Universities and Schools are money making machines. No one opens these institutions for charity.
For instance, some of the said "repressive" policies are now in place because the students have misused the liberty given to them in the past. We all know that there have been numerous instances when students were caught flouting the rules and/or misbehaving with the staff/guards/fellow students/faculty members without any provocation.
How about this? How about we build a culture of trust and responsibility on campus and show the admin through sustained gestures that we will not abuse our freedom, in any sense of the word. Maybe, the admin will revoke these "repressive" rules.
I hope you understand that while your motives are noble, they are inherently contradictory. You want to make the college a better place BUT you refuse to cooperate.
Note: The comment is directed at the student body in general, and not the author of this post.
Atleast with the increase of student intake per year, they should build a new academic block and more hostels rather than cramp us all together.
Jindal is messing itself up.
No locus.
YOU KNOW NOTHING!!!
P.S: I kindly request you to refrain from using the word 'collectively' hereafter and please talk for yourself.
1. The fee is somewhere between 5.5 lakhs to 7.25 lakhs per annum (so total tuition fee cost in 5 yrs comes between 27.5 lakhs to 36.25 lakhs), the accommodation etc. cost 1.75 lakhs pa (so total will be 8.75 lakhs). Therefore the total cost of BA/BBA LLB (Hons) at JGLS over 5 yrs will be between 36.25 lakhs to 45 lakhs. But this cost is low because it is "subsidized by the generosity and philanthropy of its Chancellor Mr. Naveen Jindal."
Spend 15 lakhs more and get LLB from Cambridge. I am sure if one can spend 45 lakhs one can spend 15 more and surely more opportunities than JGLS. (£15k*3 for tuition and £8k*3 for living costs)
2. “Res ipsa loquitur” is latin. So “Res ipsa loquitur” on my calculation on the precious point.
3. "It is widely acknowledged that JGU has the best faculty." Dunno about that, perhaps, but JGU definitely can draft a reply better than BCI.
So the policy roughly is that you must have at the end of the year successfully completed so and so number of minimum credits or alternatively so and so number of subjects to be able to pass to the next year. Which is to say that you are allowed to have a back log of subjects that you take to the next year but that back log must not exceed a minimum number. So that by the time you reach fifth year you don't have a 25 subject back log.
It is not a very difficult threshold to meet but students are VERY lax. Since this policy has been introduced only a ear ago, there will be a number of defaulters, but if you think about it, in due time, number of defaulters should go down- students will slowly start to internalise the policy and be aware and be more responsible.
I do not see anything wrong in the yearback policy. If the student has not been able to pass a minimum number of subjects in an academic year, them he/she should obviously not be promoted. So, to answer your question, students may not be promoted due to actual performance issues.
Sample this:
On why group emails have to be screened, the administration responds: "Mass mails are subject to Mail Moderation Policy and as per global practices in vogue."
This is entirely incorrect. As someone who somehow studied at Oxford and Harvard, Professor Raj Kumar should know that students at Oxford, Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Cambridge, Columbia and other leading law schools are able to freely express views by sending mass emails within the student community. I have attended the LLM at Harvard and have friends at the other law schools and are emails are never "screened" or "moderated" by the faculty or administration. God help these serious institutions if the administration decides to waste time on screening every God-damn email that is sent around on the Google group!
So, NO, there are no such "global practices in vogue"! I could go on and on about how this response is disappointing but I have better things to do than the JGLS administration.
If you have the greatest law faculty, perhaps the administration should learn how to write in a reasoned manner from the faculty at JGLS.
I attended a college in Pune. Forget infrastructure and facilities, I attended lectures at my whims and went for chai-sutta at a nearby Canteen during breaks/lectures. Most of my semester I went to pubs and discs- partied and drank to my heart's content.
But a month before the exam, studied real hard to score well. Interned during break- back to college-partied- had wonderful group to hangout with.
On a serious note, while other things like faculty and infra matter, it is you who can make a difference in your life. I understand you may be aghast at certain things but move on and that's about it.
These are the best years of your life. When you enter a law firm/company after college, you are gonna miss these days. Home-office-home can is really mundane. We have only weekends to look forward to.
So chill out and study hard to achieve whatever you wish for.
I loved my college despite every nonsensical stuff that used to happen around. I was good enough only to make it to my college and i accepted the fact.
I still think those 5 years were the best years of my life and will always be.
Cheers.
And of course there will be students left frustrated if their college messes around with their future. Then again, this is the problem with many money-driven private colleges.
It is to be noted that students have to pay additional charges to utilize such facilities and the vendors are also asked to pay rent. So there is a return on this investment and such an increase should not amount to increase in fee as explained in the letter above.
Keeping all other things apart, I would just like to focus on quality education as promised by the vice chancellor all the time.
For point no 9, I would like to name a few people :- [...](check the feedbacks given and assistant dean Prof Majumdar is very well aware of the situation). Check the time table for coming semester and you will see [them] teaching again. There is hardly any good faculty teaching [...] law. There is one very good professor [...] for [...] law yet [they] is been off campus for over 1.5 year and might not be there next semester as well. Now what about the students who are paying high tuition fees and not getting an opportunity of being taught by good faculty, even if it is one subject(and when I say [...] law this is just one example). [...] is in faculty list on website to show the world that there is brilliant faculty but has not been on campus since long. Another one is [...].
It hurts and students are helpless when after paying such huge sum a student is deprived of getting taught by a good faculty member knowing the fact that the other one section is getting value for money. On top of all this, the assistant dean answers “that you can’t compare Mommy and Daddy”.
For certain subjects there are a lot of faculty members than the actual number required but for some there is hardly any good faculty(just one may be).
Check [...]’s student feedbacks(RTI can verify this and nothing is blatant lie). Not everyone who has good knowledge can teach. [They] has been promoted from [...].
One talks of academic freedom yet no faculty are allowed to publish anti Naveen Jindal. [...] will throw more light on this and can be contacted.
It’s time the vice chancellor comes out of this global phobia. File an RTI and see how many conferences are conducted and large sum spent on this. This might be good but the number of conferences is such large that both student body and faculty members are getting sick of it. Everyone is forced to attend these conferences even during exam time.
This is just a little food on the platter and more coming up in some comment later.
Registrar's response is a blatant lie as far as hostel policies are concerned. One of the 2011 year batch student, had raised this issue more than an year back in the open house with the vice chancellor. She had questioned that why parents were not taken into account for hostel allocation(like they say hathi ke dan dikhane ke aur khane ke aur as the rooms that were shown at the time of admission were super block and now 4 sharing allotment)since they are the ones paying huge sum out of their hard earned money. Vice chancellor had no concrete answer to this.
Check the website and the images of hostel rooms are removed now.
www.jgu.edu.in/content/accommodation
www.jgu.edu.in/content/desk-vice-chancellor
www.forbes.com/sites/meghabahree/2013/06/12/indian-billionaire-naveen-jindal-in-trouble-again/
Difficult to take the University's response at face value. Looks like Kian will have to go stay at JGLS for a fortnight or two ;)
JGU students to study at Oxford, Columbia Universities
Press Trust of India | New Delhi June 04, 2015 Last Updated at 19:22 IST
Over 60 students of the Jindal Global Law School have been selected for pursuing academic programmes at Columbia Law School in USA and University of Oxford in the UK.
O P Jindal Global University (JGU) said in a press statement that the students will be participating in the US Business Law Academy at Columbia University and undertake intensive study of US Business laws under the programme.
The programme at Columbia University will feature an introductory survey of select topics covering US business law and legal institutions such as corporations, corporate governance, mergers and acquisitions, US tax and policy among others.
In the academic programme at Somerville College of Oxford University, students will be taught by some of experts in International Law and Global Governance, it said.
Hailing the programme, Prof C Raj Kumar, Vice Chancellor of JGU, said "besides providing knowledge and perspectives on international and comparative law on issues relating to global governance and business law, the experience of studying at Oxford and Columbia will be transformative for our students".
"They will study basic key principles of international law and global governance and some contemporary issues in the field, including protection of human rights, use of force, regulation of armed conflict and protection of environment," it said.
Its very impressive that Jindal has some killer faculty (at least relative to even the best law schools in India) and thats SOLELY because they pay them some what comparable salaries to a corp job (obviously the big firms pay more but extract a lot more too). when the fees are told to you upfront - if you have a problem with it, dont join. Dont mean to sound insensitive but thats the harsh reality of the matter. I dont see ppl whining abt MBA fees which are way higher. nothings perfect and from what i hear jindals doing a pretty good job.
That apart, ive always had this apprehension that the high fees stifles diversity which i think was a great part of my law school experience. Id love to see them bring in some diversity somehow.
Also there is a lot of hype created about the faculty. You do not become a great teacher by doing 1 year llm abroad where teaching happens for 9 months and actually less than 200 hours.
Though the outside picture is excellent when you come closer you learn about these serious problems that are going to hamper the learning process...
From Terrorist & Sleazy Administrative Staff that compares themselves with ISB who will do anything to protect the image of institution and admit anyone who is willing to pay the hefty money(Tution Fees) into the law school.....
Please explain how can you manage over 3500 students (in next 5 years) can be put into 40 classrooms are you planning on conducting classes till the night?
Now please don't use this statement "This statement is inaccurate and does not reflect the true picture"
PS:views of a potential student.
That is the most simplest & stupidest answer ever ....
Probably thats due to the type of teaching you get....
Hope all jiggles are not like you!!!
1. The fee increase has happened because of 2 reasons:
a) Jindal has four other schools (public policy, liberal arts, business and international affairs). These schools are useless and making massive losses, so the law school has to make up for them.
b) The student's claim that the high fees at JGLS pays faculty salaries is not true. Faculty salaries have stagnated and, in some cases, decreased to levels comparable to NLUs. Trust me on this, I have heard it from the horse's mouth. The money JGLS makes goes elsewhere (better not to say).
2. But the student is right about teacher attrition.
3. Faculty are as frustrated as students. 3 faculty members now share an office meant for 1 person, so faculty cannot work in peace. More faculty is being recruited as more students are being recruited, but there is no space for faculty.
Is it worth the money being spent ?
is it worth? no
4 Indian students selected for judicial clerkship at Hawaii SC
By PTI | 3 Jul, 2015, 06.33PM ISTPost a Comment
Four Indian students have been selected for a six-week judicial clerkship programme in the Supreme Court of Hawaii in the US.
NEW DELHI: Four Indian students have been selected for a six-week judicial clerkship programme in the Supreme Court of Hawaii in the US.
Girl students Aparajita Sheel, Ishnoor Saini and Swarnim Swasti, studying in the 4th year of BA LLB in Jindal Global Law School, and 3rd-year student Avni Choudhary have been selected for the Summer Clerkship Programme, a release issued by O P Jindal Global University (JGU) said.
"The Summer Clerkship Programme at the Supreme Court of Hawaii is a wonderful opportunity for the students for gaining a strong grounding in the US law including substantive and procedural law. This programme aims to promote global legal education," Professor C Raj Kumar, Vice Chancellor of JGU and Dean of Jindal Global Law School, said.
The release said that the clerkship will provide the students opportunity to witness US State Supreme Court proceedings.
It said the programme was conceived during the visit of Hawaii Supreme Court Judge Justice Michael Wilson here in March this year.
Well and good until it is reported through media... after that the game is serious!
For past cases ending in 66A arrests after media taking up the news, you should this case started by open letters and how it ends
How it starts janamejayaneconomics.wordpress.com/2012/11/01/indian-expats-fight-fee-hike-through-blogs/
How it ends janamejayan.wordpress.com/2012/11/01/one-more-case-of-misuse-of-section-66-a-of-it-act/
Good luck in any case
Firstly, from what I have gathered here, we hate the fact that the administration is treating every student like a money making machine, providing no returns at the end. Some misconceptions about the fees need to be removed: More than 50% of every batch gets a studentship/ scholarship/Haryana domicile. The finance dept along with the admin is so accommodating on requests for financial aid, that blatantly quoting the fees to be around 7 lacs seems plain ignorant. Students either performed well in the LSATs and got a scholarship or do well regularly during the academic year, and can avail of such aid. So instead of whining, maybe try studying. More than that, we have Research Assistantships and Teaching Assistantships for over 20 Research centres and all Associate Professors, who can avail of a monthly stipend. But the students are just TOO lazy to even think of applying for such opportunities because they're too busy whining about, I dont know, Amul.
Let's talk about academics. It's so funny that students who in one sentence whine about professors treating students like school children, whine in the next sentence about entitlements and rights. Since spoon-feeding is definitely not what you want, go and get 110% from the faculty members. They are the most qualified members of legal academia. At the same time I would like to draw out a distinction between those who are brilliant in their fields and those who are brilliant professors. While they try to cover the gap between the two, the students need to step up as well. At the risk of making a prejudged opinion, half of the university is on campus just to smoke up or got to ethnic every night. If they actually had a conversation with any professor, they'd realise how much time is invested in recruitment processes.
The international exposure that students at Jindal get is absolutely unprecedented. And discounting it by putting a price to it is plain stupid. Obviously a programme to Columbia or Oxford will cost 3.5-5 lacs. You can't expect to go for free, or can you, because "oh, entitlements".
It's disgusting to see such a whiny attitude amongst future lawyers. The college is literally 6 years old! There will be problems that every member of the faculty and student community will face. But you need to take collective responsibility for the same. It's about time we stop blaming others for what's wrong within our college and start taking responsibility for our own actions. As one of the posts has already iterated, reckless driving, beating up guards drunk, abusing Sodexo workers, allegedly raping a student and sexually harassing so many more, not respecting the bhaiyas and didis, from the wardens to the man who makes your keys every time you carelessly lose them, and demand one instantaneously because "oh, entitlements".
I dont understand the point of whining about not having non-veg on campus anymore because we have an air-conditioned non-veg bistro now. Yes, the ATM machine may not work all the time. But that's absolutely no reason to create a havoc. Understand your priorities. Understand why you are in law school in the first place. Yes, your parents are spending a hefty amount in sending you here. It's an investment. So instead of pulling up the administration for every shortcoming for the lacs that you gave them, see how YOU can make your parents proud by utilising the facilities at JGU.
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