Algo Legal has partnered with NUJS Kolkata to start a “legal innovation and technology” eight-week course for third- to fifth-year students from 15 December 2020.
Algo chief innovation officer Rasmeet Charya commented: “The course will be guided by industry experts across legal technology and innovation areas who will share their practice experience and real life scenarios with students.”
There was no upper limit on the number of students who could participate due to the online course consisting of “lectures and assignments but the assignments are light, more practical and interesting for students”, said Charya.
Applications for the course were currently still ongoing, so final numbers were not available for the course, she added.
The course is purely optional and is not a credit course, without an examination.
According to a press release from the firm, which had been launched with in 2019 with a “mission to transform the practice of law”:
The curriculum of the course has a diverse set of interesting subjects from insights on data digitalization and smart documentation to concepts of legal design thinking and culture of compliance. The course currently has 18 sessions that will spread across eight weeks and will see a unique mix of internal and external experts taking the students through the basics of legal innovation and technology.
The course would be “guided by inputs from industry experts across legal technology and innovation areas”, according to its statement.
Algo declined to share a more detailed syllabus or curriculum of the programme at the time, though it said it might do so after the course has completed (if any NUJS students have a copy and details of the course, please do share in the comments).
The firm also declined to comment on whether Algo intended to run the programme at other law schools in future.
Algo founder and managing partner Sandeep Kapoor said in the release: “The lawyers of tomorrow will be professionals who are multi-faceted and equipped with the knowledge and expertise to practice law while adapting and implementing to the changes that technology will infuse into the industry.
“Algo Legal has been committed to the vision of fostering innovation and tech adoption in the legal ecosystem since its inception.
“Our course was curated thoughtfully over the past several months with the intention to bring practice innovation, share the best practices on the ‘how to’ and benefits of legal tech and to make law students and legal professionals future ready for the evolving law practice.”
NUJS vice chancellor Prof NK Chakrabarti said in the press release: “Given the rapid advance being made by technology in all domains including the legal sector, it is imperative that law students are exposed at the earliest to the fundamentals of usage of legal technology and its various short-term and long-term implications for their chosen sector.
“Not only would such exposure prepare them to be better professionals capable of optimising their effectiveness in the world outside the university, but it might also trigger ideas latent in them and pave the way for future innovation and growth.
“As an institution committed to educational excellence, we at NUJS are glad that our students are getting such an opportunity offered to them by a reputed law firm such as Algo Legal and the domain experts who are going to offer this course. Hopefully, this marks the start of a long and fruitful collaborative relationship that would help our students turn into next generation lawyers comfortable with wielding legal technology to solve a multitude of problems in the legal domain.”
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Other things to do:
1. Improve the website
2. More NLU alumni faculty and ensure that the current hires are not compromised by political pressure
3. Good guest faculty for electives
I am hopeful things will improve from May 2021 onwards, when the deadwood in the governing bodies will be shunted out and West Bengal will have a new law minister, education minister and AG.
See this report by LI on how iPleaders and alumni running it were humiliated by the SJA.
www.legallyindia.com/lawschools/are-nujs-online-courses-illegal-ipleaders-ex-sja-prez-arjun-agarwal-argue-out-each-side-of-the-case-20190520-10327
And also hyperlinked in an article published recently thewire.in/rights/right-to-information-opacity-nlu-travails
What I don't get is why does the EC, which included some veteran and progressive faculty members earlier (even when Justice Talukdar was the VC), repeatedly agree with the assertions of this pesky SJA fellow? Even recently despite repeated attempts by NKC, the EC reiterated its earlier decision and even questioned why the inquiry hasn't been completed and action taken against the alleged perpetrators.
What's really happening?
The NIRF 2020 ranking had this sub-ranking for RPC score:
TOP 10:
1. IIT KGP: 73.78/100
2. NLUD: 45.21/100
3. NLSIU: 41.07/100
4. NALSAR: 39.74/100
5. GNLU: 35.83/100
6. NUJS: 35.19/100
7. RGNUL: 29.23/100
8. KIIT: 27.06/100
9. NLUJ: 26.85/100
10. NLIU: 24.98/100
Thus, NUJS is quite behind and needs to catch up.
1. The current law minster has a dubious record. His legal stature is also highly questionable, as he was a mere small-time trial court lawyer in Asansol and that too for a brief while.
2. I also hope you accept that the current AG is also a little-known lawyer and nowhere near the illustrious giants who Mamata appointed before him and all of whom resigned in protest against her government, i.e. barrister and Sr Adv Bimal Chatterjee, barrister and Sr Adv Anindya Mitra and barrister and Sr Adv Jayanta Mitra. The present AG was, in contrast, a junior to the highly controversial TMC politician Kalyan Banerjee. Furthermore, the SJA has openly complained against the AG (see previous LI reports).
Now, let us look ahead:
1. Yes, the BJP is a communal party and their West Bengal unit has many dubious characters.
2. You forget, however, that NUJS will be in the hands of the Law Minister and AG, as it is too small for the CM to work about. Thus, the key question is who will occupy these posts, not the CM's chair.
3. In contrast with the TMC, the BJP has far more competent people handling their legal affairs. These include:
- Som Mandal, Executive Committee Member National Executive BJP Legal Cell. He got a ticket in the last assembly election and will get one here too. A strong candidate for Law Min.
- Kabir Bose, LLB (Nottingham) and barrister and law, BJP Bengal spokesman. He too will get a ticket. A possible candidate for junior Law Min.
- Soumendranath Mookerjee, LLB (Cambridge), Barrister at law and Sr Adv, one of the top lawyers in Cal: Though he once stood for election on a BJP ticket and his father is a former BJP Union Minister, he is not actively in politics right now. However, his association with the BJP cannot be denied and he is also representing cases involving BJP leaders. A strong candidate for AG.
Furthermore, BJP members or people close to the BJP who are outside Bengal may be drafted into the GC. (Harish Salve, Mukul Rohatgi, Pinky Anand, Vikramjit Banerjee, Madhavi Divan etc).
Isn't this better than the prospect of the TMC returning?
Forget about communal nature of BJP, just look at its track record with regard to education! Cutting down grants everywhere, focused only on universities celebrating yoga day and swachh bharat divas etc. The lawyers whom you named are all small fries politically and don't determine any policy even when in opposition, let alone if they come to power. The biggest question that 2.1 has asked, what's stopping BJP to support the NLUs while it is in power in the Centre? Why not give them INI status and autonomy? I agree with the points you've made about the current law minister and AG though, but there is no reason to expect that the next lot would be any better. The only way ahead is to nationalise the NLUs and remove these ex officio posts from governing bodies or make them a minority.
www.legallyindia.com/lawschools/mp-meenakshi-lekhi-to-introduce-nationalise-nlu-bill-in-lok-sabha-tomorrow-20191205-11064
www.thestatesman.com/supplements/law/national-law-universities-need-structural-reform-1502885439.html
blog.ipleaders.in/national-law-universities-need-for-nationalization/
www.thelwordblogg.com/post/national-law-universities-islands-of-excellence-or-double-double-toil-and-trouble
blog.ipleaders.in/origin-story-ipleaders-lawsikho-onwards/
The dating workshop fiasco has not affected ipleaders one bit. Their clientele is not NLU/law firm types who read LI. That controversy was quite petty (in hindsight) compared to the blatantly illegal acts of NUJS in abruptly stopping the courses as well as the unbaked "advice" the luminaries of the college governing bodies acted upon in taking that decision.
Regarding ipleaders' clientele, so you are agreeing that they essentially target students who don't really know about what is going on in the legal world and what do the recruiters value actually. Glad to see we agree on that point.
The administration was advised to limit avoidable litigation costs by putting up a public notice concerning refunds. But they avoided doing that. Instead repeated attempts were made to start distance education courses (again without UGC approval). Those got shot down by the EC. Hence a "minor" shuffle was made in the AC and EC. But again the VC got censured. Maybe things will brighten now with the entry of his "friend" from SC.
As they say, a good lawyer knows the law but a great lawyer (or VC) knows the....(Thor now you know where your hammer is...pretty useless though)
1. Did AM ensure that iPleaders etc petitions reached the EC for discussion? Records show that it was Justice Talukdar and Law Minister, Mr Moloy Ghatak who ensured that emails by aggrieved students are placed before the EC, which had a thorough discussion and reiterated the ban because the UGC approvals that had been "promised" in earlier AC and EC meetings by the alleged perpetrators (named here www.thestatesman.com/supplements/law/distance-education-mess-1502764247.html) wasn't there. Why would Talukdar, Ghatak and Co dilute their alleged anti-iPleaders position with these emails?
What does AM, the "head" of SDME do? Zilch. When questioned why isn't he responding to queries of affected distance education students, AM has no answer. Registrar Sen helps him avoid show cause notices etc.
2. What does another well known iPleader faculty and ex-EC member do? Zilch. Despite petitioning EC on seniority, NAAC etc and massive (anonymous) keyboarding here. Of course "talks" with Registrar Sen certainly helped in holding off disciplinary action. So emboldened a promotion scan was engendered later with active support from NKC who was heading the scrutiny and interview panels.
3. This www.thestatesman.com/supplements/law/distance-education-mess-1502764247.html was published in July 2019. The ex-SJA president had openly named the alleged perpetrators earlier as well in petitions to EC and Chancellor. No legal action taken by the alleged perpetrators till date or even contested in the EC.
4. From this thewire.in/rights/right-to-information-opacity-nlu-travails we know that NUJS administration has diligently and consistently stonewalled RTI requests. NKC and Co stand totally exposed. It is very clear that the rot runs deep and starts from the top.
5. No fan of Talukdar. He let things slide into a deadly paralysis. Whether he really wanted a clean-up or not is debatable. Maybe he was too slow and cautious figuring out and taking action against entrenched interests. But certain things were exposed and action taken (albeit limited) under his watch. Under the new VC, it is PIB 2.0
Why couldn't AM reply to aggrieved distance education students that the courses did not have UGC approval, which was belatedly realized by the powers that be in NUJS and therefore the courses have been taken off. In fact, why didn't AM bring the entire bunch of emails and letters etc to the EC and show the response he could give in his "limited" capacity?
Why does AM and Co avoid responding to RTIs concerning distance education? Head of SDME. What a joke.
1. EC too a decision to ban the courses as they lacked the necessary approvals. These courses never had the UGC approval and nor did NUJS have the UGC approval to run distance edu courses. NUJS also lacked approval from the erstwhile DEC, IGNOU.
2. EC has initiated an inquiry. Kindly send your grievances etc to the VC with a copy to Registrar and Head, SDME
3. Your emails etc will be duly forwarded to the VC so that those can be brought before the EC. As an EC member, I will also take those along and insist on a thorough discussion in EC (but actually I wouldn't for obvious reasons)
4. Will honestly and transparently respond to RTIs concerning distance education (actually wouldn't for obvious reasons)
5. Since these courses never had the due approvals from IGNOU/UGC and clearly an illegal act cannot be allowed to continue, I will do my best to convince NUJS to make necessary refunds (but I woudn't because the money trail....)
Barring a few recent ones, all distance edu courses of NLS had approvals from DEC, IGNOU and later from UGC during the transition from IGNOU to UGC.
If a proper scrutiny is done then NLS courses too ran afoul for 2-3 years. But that's for NLS and UGC. Just because UGC has a weak enforcement machinery and NLS or any others that got away, it does not mean that when the scam got exposed in NUJS, then AM and Co can use that as an excuse.
There hasn't been a drastic change in the composition of the AC/EC that "approved" iPleaders courses and the EC that placed the ban. You could say that some of the key alleged perpetrators such as a former VC and Registrar (Acting) were allowed to scoot and another's term ended. AM then in the EC realized silence is golden and played victim before fellow sympathizer Registrar Sen.
The EC,irrespective of personnel changes, has always given a wide berth to successive VCs. That's how iPleaders courses got approval. So when the EC does something that is profitable for AM and Co, it is all learned etc. But when it refuses to ignore damning evidence then the same EC is full of fools etc?
This is a fake comment. This is the real picture:
- Saurabh Bhattacharjee, BALLB NALSAR and LLM Michigan
- Ruchika Ghosh, BALLB NUJS and LLM London, ex-Khaitan
- Paramita DasGupta, BALLB NUJS and LLM London, ex-AMSS
All have impressive qualifications and are very good profs.
Then there are "desi NUJS" alumni faculty like Guha, Sen and Tarafder, who are also good.
That's the true picture at NUJS. A bleak one, kind of like roadside tea gone cold.
Just to be clear I have nothing against these two, just pointing out the hilarity of bragging about someone being oh-so-cool because of a couple of years at a firm.
twitter.com/suchitrav/status/1317296343438811136
A student disagreed with Suchita (which dear sir he is entitled to)
Suchita thinks he used stuff said by her in a closed door session at NUJS to attack her - and this breaches the rules of the session
The guy clearly didn’t - he showed the (unconnected and public) article which he was relying on
Story should’ve ended there
Guy didn’t abuse or be inappropriate online anyway
[...]
Holds true for India as well and certainly quite a few NLUs.
1. Predatory/mediocre publishing by NLU professors to jack up publication count. The case of a "particular" professor at NUJS, who started his own journal and published garbage there, is epic. Cases also exist at certain other NLUs. What do these professors have to say for themselves?
2. LI reported that NLSIU and JGLS submitted data to QS and got ranked. How does QS verify the accuracy of the data? Same with NIRF. Anyone can submit anything and lie blatantly.
.
2. It does not. In fact, I have been told by multiple young JGLS faculty that on joining, they are asked to nominate a few overseas academics whom they know personally. Then JGLS would give those names to QS, and these faculty would be required to soft-talk and use their personal connections to ensure that those academics give a 5-star review to the university when QS gets in touch with them, all without actually knowing what is happening at the university. It has proven to be an effective hack so far, though not exactly ethical, which is why several faculty are not very keen on doing it, but apparently it is something that they would be 'strongly encouraged' to do nonetheless.
Searchable list: www.scopus.com/sources?zone=TopNavBar&origin=NO%20ORIGIN%20DEFINED
Full list: www.elsevier.com/?a=91122
Kian, if you know any academic with a SCOPUS account, you can verify my claim, or you can easily google yourself the term SCOPUS discontinued lists. Several researchers are kind enough to upload those on public domain like researchgate after downloading that list from SCOPUS.
What exactly are you referring to as 'fake' here? Even this discontinued list is from the Elsevier website only! Every year, there are 2-3 such lists published by them. Which is why one should consider any SCOPUS publication independently based on how well-known and reputed the journal is, peer-review standards, citation metric etc. Merely being indexed in SCOPUS is not a guarantee of quality. As the other commentator said, academics who actually publish are aware of that. Trolls are not. It is pretty clear to which group you belong.
Here you go, blabbermouth. The link to a slightly older discontinued list. If you had been a little better at doing research, then you might have got SCOPUS publications yourself.
idea-en.cerge-ei.cz/news/46-predatory-journals-in-scopus
link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00038-019-01318-w
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7520066/
This guy claiming that all SCOPUS journals are amazing and not predatory clearly has got no clue about the real world. I doubt he has ever got any of his own papers published anywhere worthwhile. If even after this, he keeps on ranting, that would mean that he's a troll, nothing else.
- Lexis Nexis
- Westlaw
- Hein Online
- JSTOR
The leading Indian journals are listed in of these too, such as JILI and various NLU journals.
www.news18.com/news/politics/rebel-tmc-leader-suvendu-adhikari-likely-to-join-bjp-this-week-in-shahs-presence-may-be-given-z-security-3179246.html
www.legallyindia.com/lawschools/jindal-gu-sonepat-hacks-into-lower-reaches-of-qs-world-college-rankings-in-benchmarking-drive-though-methodology-a-bit-hazy-20190619-10646
Just pause for a minute and think how big a story this is, because the entire Institution of Eminence Scheme (the budget for which is Rs 10,000 crore) + National Education Policy is based keeping in mind the QS ranking. But what the commenter has revealed is that you can hack into the lower tier of the ranking by having a low research score but a high perception score, based on recommendations by your friends whose list you will submit to QS. You give QS 500 names and they contact 20 people randomly, but you know all the 500 will give a good reco anyway.
This is not cheating or unethical, but what it means is that you can outrank a better university solely though PR. This explains why JGLS outranked NLSIU.
Inefficiency helped apparently. But who? Just like inefficiencies of NLUs help those in power and their acolytes.
Additional info: He did not get elected as president twice. Both the times nobody else had bothered to contest the election, which goes to show the apathy of the 'apolitical student body' that can be 'instrument for change'. Several years down the line, the institution is still reeling from the 'impact' of his activity of getting politicians involved to interfere in the institutional policies and autonomy. His intentions might have been good to begin with, but the lack of [...] foresight displayed harmed the institution more in the long run than anything else. Not to mention that those last-minute arguments prepared, as proudly mentioned in the interview, used to contain glaring loopholes when it came to facts, which is one of the main reasons why he needed to stage a strike to get his demands met instead of getting others convinced through his arguments.
[...]
1. Kicked out PIB without making backup plans. Gave a statement welcoming Amit Talukdar as VC and praising him, but Talukdar proved to be even worse.
2. Kicked out iPleaders, resulting in loss of revenue and reputation for the college.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madagascar_(2005_film)
Methinks both the comments are by Plead A Lot.
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