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GNLU wins Nani Palkhivala tax moot, ‘shatters’ style-over-substance mooting myth

MPL 4: The home of Indian mooting
MPL 4: The home of Indian mooting

GNLU Gandhinagar trumped NUJS Kolkata to win the ninth edition of India’s oldest tax moot - the Nani Palkhivala Memorial - on Saturday.

The Tier 4 win, on GLC Mumbai turf, earned GNLU 15 points picking it up eight places in the standings in the MPL 4, sponsored by Herbert Smith. The college now sits at number six, three places below the now third-ranking NUJS.

Jindal Global Law School (JGLS) Sonipat won the award for best memorial, while HNLU Raipur’s Shobhit Koshta picked up the best researcher prize. Jamia Milia Islamia Delhi’s Shafaq was declared the best speaker. Jamia is now in second place of the MPL, ahead of NUJS Kolkata and JGLS.

Prateek Kumar, Aditi Tambi and Ishita Farsaiya from the winning GNLU team also bagged an internship with Nishith Desai Associates.

Researcher Farsaiya was all praises for GLC’s “superb” hosting of the event in terms of accommodation, mooting venue and the food served. “Whether we win or lose, the way these people have treated us, we’ve had one hell of a time,” she said.

She also noted: “There’s this general belief that people from national law schools do better than most because of their argument style; the concept was shattered. The bench actually wanted good arguments. If you’re just a sharp speaker it won’t matter, [it’ll just reflect in your marks]. They wanted a sound legal argument.”

Second-placed NUJS was represented by Dhvani Shah, Puneeth Ganapathy and Nihal Joseph.

The other awards distributed include the prize for the second best speaker for which ULC Bangalore’s A Mahesh Chowdhary and Bangalore Institute of Legal studies’ speaker Pranjit Bhattacharya were tied, and the Nani Palkhivala Memorial Research Paper Competition from last year’s edition of the moot which was taken away by RGNUL Patiala’s Arnab Naskar and Shubhangi Gupta.

26 teams including previous MPL seasons’ goliaths and recent Manfred Lachs world rounds winners NLSIU Bangalore participated in the competition. NLSIU had clinched victory at the moot last year.

We are still evaluating suitability of the Amity Noida moot, as well as confirming results for the Surana Trial North-East rounds.

 International law firm Herbert Smith is sponsoring the Mooting Premier League (MPL) and will contribute a prize pool of Rs 60,000 for the top three winning colleges.

Mooting Premier League 4 season standings

Pos Law school T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 Org W R/u S/F B S B M/R HM Pts Details
1 NLSIU Bangalore 100       10   2     1 1   110 [Surana Trial Adv - South] (gold); [Manfred Lachs Space Moot World Rounds] (gold, best memo, best orator)
2 Jindal Global Law School 15 8 10 1 1 1 33

[Nani Palkhivala] (Best Memorial)][Henry Dunant] (best researcher, semis); [Surana Trial Adv - North] (gold);

3 Faculty of Law, Jamia Milia Islamia University     10 8 10     1   1 1   28 [Nani Palkhivala (Best speaker)][Henry Dunant (Best memo), [Surana Trial adv-North (Silver, best speaker)]
4 NUJS Kolkata       8 20   1     2     28 [Nani Palkhivala (runners up)][BR Sawhney (Best peaker)][SLCU Moot (Gold, Best speaker)]
5 NLU Delhi     20     1 1           21 [Henry Dunant] (gold); [NLU Delhi Corp Moot] (organiser);
6 GNLU Gandhinagar       15 5         1     20 [Nani Palkhivala] (best team); [NLU Delhi Corp Moot] (Best speaker)
7 RMLNLU Lucknow         20   1       2   20 [NLU Delhi Corp Moot] (gold, best researcher); [Surana Trial Adv - North] (best memo);
8 GLC Mumbai     10 8           1     18 Henry Dunant (Best speaker)
9 NLU Jodhpur     10   6     1 2       16 [Henry Dunant] (silver); [Surana Trial Adv - North] (semis); [B.R Sawhney Moot] (semis) ;
10 RGNUL Patiala       4 8     1 1       12 [NLU Delhi Corp Moot] (semis); B. R Sawhney Moot (runners up), Nani Palkhivala (semis)
11 Department of Law, North-Eastern Hill University     10             1     10 [Henry Dunant] (best speaker);
12 KIIT School of Law         10   1           10 [B.R Sawhney Moot] (Winners) ;
13 HNLU Raipur       8                 8 Nani Palkhivala (Best Researcher)
14 School of Legal Studies, CUSAT Kochi         8       1   1   8 [Surana Trial Adv - South] (best memo, semis);
15 SVKM’s Pravin Gandhi College of Law         8       1   1   8 [SLCU Moot] (best memo, semis);
16 Nirma University     5           1       5 [Henry Dunant] (semis);
17 ILS Pune         5     1         5 [SLCU Moot] (silver);
18 NUALS Kochi         5     1         5 [NLU Delhi Corp Moot] (silver);
19 ULC Bangalore         5           1   5 [NLU Delhi Corp Moot] (best memo);
20 New Law College, Bharti Vidayapeeth University, Pune         5         1     5 [Surana Trial Adv - South] (best speaker);
21 NLU Orissa         5           1   5 [B.R Sawhney Moot] (Best Memorial) ;
22 NLIU Bhopal       4                 4 Nani Palkhivala (semis)
23 Army Institute of Law, Mohali         3       1       3 [Surana Trial Adv - North] (semis);
24 Faculty of Law, IFHE Hyderabad         3       1       3 [SLCU Moot] (semis);
25 Campus Law Centre. Delhi         3       1       3 [B.R Sawhnhey Moot] (semis);
26 School of Law, Sastra University, Thanjavur         3       1       3 [Surana Trial Adv - South] (semis);
27 School of Law, Christ University, Bangalore           1             1 [SLCU Moot] (organiser);
28 Nalsar Hyderabad           1             1 [B.R Sawhney Moot] (organisers)

For more information please refer to the MPL 3 rulebook.

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