Exclusive: Nalsar Hyderabad yesterday responded to Legally India’s Right to Information (RTI) request of 12 January, disclosing part of the highly critical September 2011 report of the three-judge committee headed by Justice Syed Shah Mohammed Quadri investigating the college.
Three weeks after Legally India’s RTI application was sent via email and by next-day courier, and one day after the Times of India published excerpts from the report reportedly stumbled across by “state auditors”, Nalsar public information officer B Nagalakshmi and RTI appellate authority and registrar professor Sridhar Acharyulu emailed Legally India a partial copy of the report of around 90 pages. More than 50 pages of the report were not sent to Legally India via the internet, due to apparent technical difficulties relating to the scanning process and the size of the file.
Acharyulu promised to send Legally India a full hardcopy of the report, as soon as the courier fees were remitted to Nalsar by Legally India.
In addition to the points reported by Times of India on Tuesday concerning financial irregularities, awarding building and other contracts as favour, the excerpts from the report prepared for the college’s chancellor, the former Andhra Pradesh Chief Justice, dealt at length with issues such as grievances in the Nalsar student body with vice chancellor Veer Singh.
[Download the partial copy of the report received by Legally India to date here]
VC’s pets
The report highlighted complaints from students and faculty about the “disproportionately concentrated” power in the office of the vice chancellor (VC), to make decisions ranging “from granting funds for various contests to granting permission to leave campus, from allowing organization of a national debate to permitting students to open the recreation room and use the drum kit therein”.
On the VC’s grant of academic leave it mentioned: “Requests by students known to him are viewed more favourably than those unknown to him … the merit of the application doesn’t matter as much as the person who would lay that application before the concerned authority.”
Four keys, but one dismissal
The report alleged a “complete lack of security in ensuring secrecy of the question papers for the final semester examinations”, referring to the leakage of question papers of the internal April 2011 examination. Keys to the examination room were available with the VC, registrar, examination section in charge and cleaning staff.
It noted in particular: “Curiously it was only the office assistant cum driver who was dismissed from service. Four students involved in this unsavory episode, were expelled from the University. The pay of the Sr. Assistant (Examination) was reduced by four annual increments, and the Jr. Assistant in the examination section was warned.”
On the absence of measures against the VC and other administrators, it added: “Except for reconstitution of the examination committee, none of the faculty were faulted for such serious lapses in leakage of the final semester examination question papers. Neither the examination committee, nor any one else in upper echelons of administration, were held accountable, let alone any action taken against them”.
Sub-dictatorship
Quadri’s committee reported that it encountered across a “widespread belief” among faculty and students that Nalsar proctor and professor Vijender Kumar “has been accorded favoured treatment by the Vice-chancellor”.
There was particular dissatisfaction among students over Kumar’s role as convener of the moot court committee. The report noted: “he identifies and selects students for participation in moot court competitions, both within the country and abroad … there is intense competition among students to participate in moot courts”.
“Several students have expressed their reservation on the manner of selection, for participation in moot courts, by the Moot Court Committee. Allegations of favouritism, in selecting students for participation in moot Courts, have also been leveled against Prof. Vijender Kumar.”
On Kumar’s tenure as chief warden in June-August 2008, the report noted: “…students of the 2005-2010 batch leveled serious allegations against him in their letter dated 08.08.2008 addressed to the then Chancellor, NALSAR”.
In this letter the students complained that “many students had been victimized by Prof. Vijender Kumar, the then Convener of the examination committee, even in his capacity as a teacher. A few such instances were cited. They also complained that a section of students, belonging to the reserved category, had been discriminated against by the said Convener, the concerned students were called to his chamber privately and were humiliated; and they were openly threatened that they would fail their examinations”.
“They also referred to ‘Child Rights and Social Duties’ consultation organized by NALSAR, for which academic leave of the student volunteers were approved by the faculty concerned and the Registrar. However the same was rejected by Prof. Vijender Kumar, the then Convener, without assigning any reasons”, added the report on the letter.
The report also mentioned the “First NALSAR Academic Review, 2009” which rated Kumar’s teaching abilities highly despite student complaints demanding his speedy removal from the examination committee and from chief warden’s post as “they had lost all confidence” in him.
Kumar did not return Legally India’s calls for comments two weeks ago.
Attitude problem?
“What’ll you do by viewing a corpse?” was Veer Singh’s alleged retort to requests for a college bus for those who wished to travel to the mortuary to pay their last respects to Nalsar student Mahesh, revealed the report.
Mahesh had died by drowning in Nalsar’s club swimming pool in June 2011, and the report highlighted that “the administration had seriously erred in informing the boy’s parents that their son had drowned in an intoxicated state, without even inserting an element of uncertainty into the pronouncement”.
The committee was informed that “the deceased student’s friends had testified, and the preliminary autopsy reports indicated, that the said student had not consumed alcohol that evening”.
The report alleged: “When they [students] expressed their grievance to the Vice-Chancellor, and requested that they be granted an additional day, (apart from the day after Mahesh’s parting), for mourning, the Vice-Chancellor had informed them ‘If your batch-mate decides to drink at 16:30 hours and then leaps into a well, what am I to do? You all killed him, why should I give you a day off?”
A jumbled state of affairs
While to a large part voicing student woes, the report also examined alleged irregular book-keeping at Nalsar, particularly in Nalsar’s conduct of the Common Law Admissions Test (CLAT) 2009.
On payment of honorariums to Nalsar staff for CLAT, the report stated: “The note put up for the approval of the Vice-chancellor, (which was approved by the Vice-chancellor on 24.9.2009), records that ‘the total amount of honorarium for CLAT-2009 staff was included in the statement of accounts which the Core Committee has approved in its meeting held on 18th September, 2009’.”
But what was actually part of the record of the 18 September meeting was merely a detailed statement of accounts, including a detailed statement of CLAT-related expenditure, which was approved before honorarium payments were made later in November, 2009, according to the report.
“That certain faculty members were paid honorarium for CLAT-2009 is not the issue. What is of concern is the lack of transparency in furnishing details thereof either in the schedule to the balance sheet or in the income and expenditure account of NALSAR for the financial year 2009-10”, adds the report.
Singh did not respond to an email seeking comments on the report yesterday.
Update: [thanks to reader comment abc for reminding us, had forgotten to include the law school ranking part of the report]
Law school rankling?
The report draws attention to “wasteful expenditure incurred” on an advertisement by Nalsar in India Today’s magazine issue that ranked the university as Indians number one law school, as reported by Legally India at the time.
“‘India-Today’, July 18th 2011 issue, carries details of the ‘India Today – Neilson’ survey of the top 10 law colleges in the country among whom NALSAR, Hyderabad is shown as No. 1. Curiously, the very same issue carries a one page advertisement by NALSAR,” highlighted the report.
The report further claimed Nalsar had a practice of advertising in those issues of India Today which carry the ratings for top 10 to 25 law colleges in India, since 2006-07, adding that “National Law School, Bangalore does not incur such needless advertisement expenditure”.
Legally India had reported at the time that NLIU Bhopal and Symbiosis Pune also had full-page advertisements, which were ranked at third and fifth respectively.
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"'India- Today', July 18th 2011 issue, carries details of the 'India Today - Neilson' survey of the Lop 10 law colleges in the country among whom NALSAR, Hyderabad is shown as No.1. Curiously, the very same issue carries a one page advertisement by NALSAR. Ever since 2006-07, NALSAR has been issuing advertisements in "India Today". The advertisements, invariably, appear in the very same issue in which the top 10 or 25 law colleges in India are rated. For the year 2006-07, "India-Today" issue dated 5.6.2006 carries an impact feature of two pages. For this advertisement feature, NALSAR paid Rs.8.00 lakhs, (Rs.7.91,636 after deducting TDS), vide Cheque No.241452 dated 13.6.2006. The said issue lists the top 10 law colleges in the country among whom NALSAR is rated as No.1.
NLU Jodhpur have always had awesome VC's.
Read the part on advertisement to see a detailed statement of howmuch NALSAR paid India Today each year and what the ranking has been in each of those years.
“Several students have expressed their reservation on the manner of selection, for participation in moot courts, by the Moot Court Committee. Allegations of favouritism, in selecting students for participation in moot Courts, have also been leveled against Prof. Vijender Kumar.”
On Kumar’s tenure as chief warden in June-August 2008, the report noted: “…students of the 2005-2010 batch leveled serious allegations against him in their letter dated 08.08.2008 addressed to the then Chancellor, NALSAR”. "
Because ofcourse there is no MCC and no Selection Moot or Open Challenges.
Administrative lapses or not, this 'report' looks like a ccp from a student plaint and not the result of an enquiry.
I'm surprised LI chose to spend so much space on something that is so obviously flawed.
Mooting in NALSAR is almost exclusively organised by the student body and the selection procedure is really not in any faculty member's hands.
We did have our share of controversy but unlike this students were proactive in bringing the NLIU glory back.
Wake up students of NALSAR before its too late. Somedays when your juniors ask you "what were you doing when all this happened?", what are you going to say?
Meet Prof. Dr. [...]. Bitten by the same bug as Veer Singh, and a mean tyrant. After being a bull in a china shop at NALSAR, he went to other law schools to ply his trade. Our man used his powers, for the lack of a better expression, do a lot of shit. One lawschool kicked him out after the students commendably rose as one and squashed his b@ll$ despite resistance from executive council. His speciality is ruling in USSR style (possibly skills picked up while he was doing his PhD in USSR). He seems to "need" to perform his idiosyncrasies to survive. They can include imposing restrictions on when students can leave campus, what activities they can engage in academically or socially, how much marks which student should get and so on. To wrap up, his sanity may be judged by a story from a summer camp (organised by NUJS in partnership with some US Ivys) where he stated that the US is "capitalist" and have made education a business where teachers and knowledge can be "bought", while the Indian traditions recognise teachers as the "guru" whose feet students touch!
I am sure there are other maniacs and despots lurking out there. Ban them all!
Would love to peruse through the Report that the above comments mention on NLSIU.
Also, are there such reports on other National Law Schools such as NUJS, NLIU, NLU etc?
Perhaps, it is time for the Chancellor of each National Law School to make public the details of expenditure on "advertising".
A clean up of any system is required. We are so happy that we could get everything out in the open and now we can cure the ills.
Even NLS had the KT Thomas report. It is good that we all can reflect and cure the evils and move ahead.
Aaaj toh daru party hoyenga!
But, GNLU students do not protest at all.
In a way, GNLU is destined to be ruled under a dictatorship.
Great going Kian!
"We are informed that, unlike NALSAR, the National
Law School, Bangalore does not incur such needless ) advertisemen t expenditure."
LOOOOL!! The verdict is now out. NSLIU is the undisputed leader, NALSAR is just a phoney.
Best of luck to the students of NALSAR.
I guess the long standing ranking of NALSAR is not due to the fact that India Today rated it as one of the better colleges. It is because of the achievements which were made by the students.
Honestly speaking, before the CLAT had come, every year 5 to 6 students used to leave NUJS to join NALSAR. This was because entrance exams of NUJS used to take place before NALSAR. Trust me, most of the students if given an option would still take NALSAR over NUJS. Admittedly, NLS was preferred over NALSAR, but, NALSAR was a very clear preference over NUJS. India Today was not the reason behind these preferences, but, infrastructure, nation wide recognition of NALSAR and other nuanced details made students choose NALSAR over NUJS.
On a separate note, I would like to tell the present study body at NALSAR that this is a tough time which we are facing, but, till the time you can work hard and do well at the national and international level, all this would just be just so much of inconsequential gossip.
NALSARITE
Before a few yeas, it was not even 3rd preference. It was not considered at all. It was considered before NLIU, Bhopal and NLU, Jodhpur.
But, with time, it has gained reputation drastically. Even until CLAT 2010, NLIU, Bhopal was preferred over NUJS. The fact that a few people prefer NUJS over NALSAR is not the factor which NUJS should be concerned.
The fact that it provided a challenge to the placements, acad, mooting of NLSIU and NALSAR [Placements were far better than NALSAR] is not something which NUJS should be concerned about. It should be NALSAR who should ponder why it is giving a challenge which it was not considered even a penny before NALSAR before a few years ago.
1 Rhodes Scholar
1 Commonwealth Scholar
1 YoungIndia Scholar
1 Felix Scholar
1 Yale Law School (FULLY Funded)
1 Harvard Law School
3 Oxford University
1 New York University (NYU)
1 University of Berkeley
Placements at par with any other Law School in the country.
Indeed, NALSAR is going down! As if we care, the statistics don't show that!!!
Don't be childish, get out of this law school fyt syndrome.Everything doesn't have to be about how some law school is going down or someone is better than other. Trust me you 'll not improve anything in your college posting such stupid comments on LI. NALSAR administration has hit a rough patch but its only a matter of time when it gets back on its feet, if you can't support your fellow students stay out of this issue completely. I am sure majority students at NUJS are not as stupid as you are, please don't force me to think otherwise.
I apologise for the comment. I commented because of the cockiness shown by your juniors, every now and then.
It is a matter of "choice". Litigation does not necessarily make you better.
Also, this really isn't about whether NALSAR is as good as NUJS or not. It's really only about whether a lot of the things that matter at university are going horribly wrong at NALSAR or not. So there's really no point in saying that NALSAR is going to the dogs. It is important that certain things be brought to the forefront though. The fact that NALSAR spent that much money on advertising, when NLS and NUJS didn't is an important fact to consider when we look at rankings (or as NALSAR-ITEs, we brag about or status as the best college in the country).
That being said, NALSAR is not going to disappear into oblivion because of this. NLS and NUJS are going to continue to do well. We're all going to continue to get wonderful jobs, win those moots in exotic european countries, trail blaze our way into glory etc.
Obviously, things are going wrong, but let's react to this in a manner worthy of us. Lets be constructive, let's tell each other what happened to us and how we dealt with it. Not like this. This is just mortifying.
Just hear song "Desert" Rose. It is good one.
I will agree however that the current administration is the most active we have had. In a good way.
Despite all the hullabaloo.
I really must commend my fellow students in NALSAR.
I am in a 'top'(whatever that means) NLU with the same issues as surfaced in NALSAR but unfortunately havent' surfaced.
The administration has too much power, and while some are intelligent, others are pathetic losers who would probably be unemployed if not on a cushy job as a teacher(which is ironical as the concepts of some are not much clearer than the students).
LI has taken up a nice initiative(and attracting website hits as reward).
Why not try this out in all NLU's.
Try and cross-check the words with ground reality, and many more interesting news might make it here.
Our NLU's are run on hard earned money of people, and if this is resulting in mismanagement, then not only LI, but other media must report such news.
I hope the young students while choosing their law school do appreciate this bias inherent in the working of this website.
Apart from lack of motive, I'd also be interested in any evidence that coverage of Nalsar in this matter is unfair or unwarranted?
Finally, do you really think that an administrative scandal of some sort, would affect the future choices of students?
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