NLUs can be pretty horrible places and lead to depression. Lots of competitive selfish students who never help others. Regional chauvinism. Sanskari admins who carry out moral policing and ban having a fun night out. Teachers from planet Mars with a different cultural mindset who you cannot relate to and confide in. Skewed male ratio with limited opportunities to make girlfriends. Always pressure to get a good CGPA, even though profs cannot teach properly.

And the wheel keeps getting reinvented. At NUJS, the tokenistic attempt of getting a counsellor has flopped. She gets paid to do nothing. Actually her recruitment itself was facilitated by her friend, a faculty member under inquiry. This faculty has been a source a severe mental harassment to quite a few students, which almost jeopardised their careers.

I will stop here and ask a few questions, which the SBA can consider lest they wish to avoid NUJS mistakes.

1. What about the faculty, starting right from the VC; and the admin staff as well? Why will they not undergo periodic psychological evaluation and counselling? After all we know domestic troubles, money issues etc can have unhinging effects and students suffer as collateral.

2. Why are counsellors, the shrink who simply gets paid to fulfill the checklist - the univ did something? Is this person empowered to speak truth to power? After all NLU administrations are structured and peopled to preserve status quo and anyone who is not formally trained in law (and often the institutional affiliation becomes unduly important) is seen as a cretin by law school administrators

3. If a thorough review is done we are likely to find that NLUs despite all the branding exemplify: those who can't. teach. If we have such frustrated souls (maybe 7th CPC will finally give them a quantum of solace) to start with, and then their own unresolved love/sex lives, domestic troubles, money stuff etc - we have a recipe for disaster

4. Sure NLU administrations should be student-centric. But why only have students under scrutiny? Will not be a bad idea to have all the students under periodic psychological evaluation. But what if the troubles run deeper - unresolved or touchy parental, family etc issues? How do we go there and how do we avoid the weaponizing of those issues by NLUs to arm twist. Eg, at NUJS, the Registrar (and her supporters) has a penchant for trying to humiliate and shame the parents for the perceived wrongs of the students; moral policing etc. HNLU and RGNUL VCs promoted this as an institutional culture. Most other NLUs are no different

5. Will the NLUs treat the counsellors with respect? I have often heard the NUJS shrink grumble that the admin couldn't care less and she is just an avoidable expense. Also she has little clue on how NUJS works. But the point is that if a qualified and experienced counsellor were to suggest meaningful, including unconventional steps that an NLU were to take at a structural level, will the administration give those a serious thought?

6. It is an uphill task and it starts with a transformative change in institutional culture, which irrespective of the NLU, is built on arrogance, greed, pettiness, opacity, obfuscation, contempt and a primal fear of change that students represent. Unfortunately, the governing bodies are also full of such rotten apples.

Law school is a strange place. While I was there it was so easy to drown yourself in thoughts about grades, placements, and how people perceived you. There were so many things going on in the world, but I was just engulfed in this bubble with a few hundred people who became too familiar.

With every passing year between law school and now, it becomes more apparent to me that very little of that experience matters now.

If you are a law student and you are reading this, that is all I really want to tell you. Law school is a small blip in what will be a long and interesting life. Everyone has their own story and their unique path. There are ups and downs, and if you feel like the downs are constant, there is no harm in getting help. There is plenty of it available if you are willing to ask for it.

The reasons are not as much complicated as made sometimes. Here student was unable to fare well in exam, so this is one reason ( SENSE OF LOSING SELF WORTH).With newfound freedom many students derail themselves from reality and experiment with all sort of things and feel empty inside, disoriented and finally unable to get out from depression. They show signs of withdrawal form surroundings, uninterested, compulsive obsessed with unpleasant event.At this point concept of buddy pair is important, who will notice signs of depression and report further for expert advice. Academic pressure will remain but nlu can do a lot in reducing it and in making a holistic approach of learning .

Legally India feeds in to these pressures by hyping law firm jobs and salaries, and encouraging students to be a part of the rat race. How many times have we seen LI profile people in less-paying jobs that are otherwise very fulfilling? There are wonderful things NLU grads are doing in UPSC, NGOs, entrepreneurship, academics etc, but for Kian only law firm-ites are rockstars. LI will just hype CAM and SAM and mention which NLU got max offers and highest salaries (a practice that even IIMs have now stopped). In comparison Bar & Bench and Superlawyer profile more diverse people.

Introspection is needed from both the college authorities and the student body. The college needs to have some kind of process to figure out in the first year who are the weaker students and give them support from the beginning, so that they have a fair chance of doing well. There will always be people who are not very comfortable with English, or get psyched out with the pace of continuous evaluation through projects and exams, etc. Over time they do suffer from lack of self esteem and pangs of doubt about themselves, as they see themselves falling behind, not to mention dealing with expectations from home to perform well in the college for which parents are paying through the nose. They have to be helped to deal with the intensity of the academic pressure.

As far as students are concerned, the most appalling part is that no one missed him for that length of time. This just means he probably had no friends and maybe was rooming alone??? Not to mention he probably had no one to speak to and unburden himself. There is a bad overall tendency to ignore certain people in the class/hostel (both boys and girls), who may not be cool or good looking or come from a semi urban/rural background and can't relate to the people around them so easily. This just adds to their frustration and makes them more and more lonely despite being surrounded by people in that small campus. Not to mention that young kids in college tend to be cruel and make fun of such outcasts and push them further into their shell. Having a friend or two to support you when you are down can make all the difference in such cases.

Kian, there have been some good comments on this thread. I think you need to reflect on your coverage of careers and salaries. You are creating an unhealthy CGPA obsession, as these firms only look at CGPA.