Readers and mooters went into tailspin last week over a perceived problem in the quality of judging at Jessup national rounds, posting over 80 comments on this apparently perennial issue. Legally India investigates.
Every year the Indian national selections for the Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot are conducted by Surana & Surana International Attorneys in partnership with different law schools in the country.
Last month teams from NLU Delhi and NUJS Kolkata qualified in North India; ILS Pune and Nalsar Hyderabad made it in South India.
Legally India talks to the winners about their experiences of the competition and the judging quality.
Losing face at high stakes?
“There are the 'established' law schools and certain irrevocable perceptions about their caliber and potential,” muses Akshay B.D., a third-year mooter from NLU Delhi who was part of the winning Jessup North team. “You see how nobody is surprised when an NLS or a Nalsar makes it to the finals of a moot but you see instantly hushed talk about low quality when a not-so-established school makes it.”
“While such perceptions are inevitable, I believe that they cannot be used to the point of judging the results of each moot in the light of such perceptions (or even expectations),” continues the winner from NLU Delhi, which is a law schools so young it yet has to see its first batch graduate. “I understand that there is a degree of responsibility that comes with being part of an established university, and the students more often than not carry such responsibility quite zealously by working hard on the moots. But, that's about as far as it can be taken. Beyond that, we must allow results to speak for themselves.”
“At the very outset, I should clarify that we lost to NLU Delhi in the finals because they were better than us in that court and conspiracy theories to the contrary are unfounded,” says Deepak Raju, who is an outspoken, veteran NUJS mooter having participated in as many as six large moots in the past. “When teams lose and blame it on judging, it is to be taken with a pinch of salt.”
MPL 2 Quicklinks:
“It is a natural defense for any team to impulsively blame the system or anything other than themselves for their loss,” chimes in Akshay. “This is something we all resort to at times, having worked so hard on a moot - our team, for instance has worked for almost 12 hours for one month before the moot and for about eight hours a day for three months.
“With the stakes being so high and the competition being cut-throat, it is but natural for teams to resort to blaming anything but themselves. It is a loss of faith to give in so much only to know you are not getting anything out of it. This is the Jessup!”
Surana & Surana’s head of academic initiatives S Ravichandran posits a similar analysis. “Too much is at stake and there’s a lot of pressure on the students nowadays - I don’t blame them. If they are last in the first round, they lose face amongst their peer group.”
”Every time when a team loses they will come and make a complaint,” he adds. “Now at Jessup too much is at stake, they pay money, for three months they prepare and if their draw in the initial rounds is with too strong team, they can be out.”
“I think there is an element of luck that is unavoidable,” agrees NLU Delhi’s Akshay. “If you are paired up against the best team in the competition in the first round, you are obviously at a loss even if you are the second best team since you have one loss and you end up not advancing.”
But the same line of argument can also be used to make the opposite point. Aditya Singh, a veteran Nalsar Mooter who lost to ILS in the finals of Surana South, says that he is aware of the dissatisfaction with the judging standards at the Jessup South rounds this year, and hopes that the criticism will trigger some reform.
“Indian law students treat mooting as an extremely serious academic exercise and put in a lot of effort, sacrificing on a range of other things. It can therefore get frustrating when you lose out because of a bad decision,” argues Singh.
Celebrity factor
NLU Delhi’s Akshay says that at this year’s Jessup North tournament the judging was fantastic. “I have participated in only one other moot - DM Harish - before this, so I may be unable to comment on the relative quality of judging. However, I can assure you that, objectively, some of the smartest lawyers from Delhi and around were flown in just to judge the rounds. Most of them were ex-mooters and international law professors.”
Nevertheless, an oft-repeated charge is that not all judges are international law experts and even the best and most well-rehearsed arguments can therefore fall on deaf ears.
NUJS’ Raju says: “It is true that the tendency of getting judges or lawyers from domestic courts (including the High Courts and the Supreme Court) to judge moots in international law does compromise the quality of the mooting experience.
“While they are eminent persons and best possible judges for a domestic law moot, that is not the case for an international law moot, given the difference in the way the two legal frameworks function. A solution may be mandating that the national round of an international moot be judged only by those who have participated in that international moot or similar moots in the past. While this may exclude celebrity judges, quality will be assured.”
NLU Delhi’s Akshay accepts that a judge may not exactly know the intricacies of the law being discussed, which could be on a “really random” topic such as on the OECD Anti-Corruption Convention but adds that it is “both unrealistic and undesirable to expect them to know it”.
He maintains that the art of mooting lies in explaining the nuanced concepts of law and at the same time establishing your case. “I think teams often miss out the first part because of which they may lose the attention of the judge even if their arguments are brilliant. The judges may not exactly appreciate such nuances if the base line of argument is not explained to them comprehensively.”
“Beyond a point, it is about convincing the judge irrespective of how much he knows,” he argues. “I think that's what mooting is all about.”
ILS’s winning Jessup South mooter Madhupreetha agrees, emphasising that an integral part of advocacy is being able to convince and deliver what the judge needs. “Legal research and points of law have to be delivered gauging the judges’ expectations.”
“We used to get feedback that said judging is bad but getting judges is really difficult,” concedes Ravichandran, adding that there are very few practicing lawyers or sitting judges in India who have international law experience. He says that ILSA always refers some names as judges, whom he invites, additionally also inviting everyone else with international law experience, of whom “90 per cent are ex-Jessupers”.
However, says Ravichandran, for the finals he has to leave it to the hosting institution to nominate a few of their own judges, which often have less international law expertise. “Some of the institutions want to bring in Supreme Court judges and we have to bring them. But two people are [always] there who know international law,” he argues.
Bad apples?
Raju notes that it would be unfair to point out a few instances of sub-optimal judging and ignore the overall quality of it, adding that a “huge majority” of judges at the Jessup North rounds were very good and many kept questioning mooters every five minutes to create the impression of an active and knowledgeable bench. “It is commendable that RMLNLU Lucknow and Surana have overcome the limitations of a nascent law school and a non-metro city to put together such a wonderful show,” he says.
ILS’ Madhupreetha also notes that absolute perfect is unrealistic. “Perfect judging at all rounds is not possible,” she says. “The South rounds were well organised and transparency has been duly reflected as the score sheets were put up promptly after the rounds”.
Nalsar’s Singh suggests that going forward, it would be imperative to involve former mooters in the organisation of national rounds of international moots. “Indian students have always excelled in international moots and a lot of them are now working in India. My hope is that we’ll see the actively involvement of these individuals in judging moots in the near future.”
Ravichandran accepts that nothing is perfect but he maintains that all the moots are organized transparently.
And while he says that he is already in touch with all the top authorities on international law who could possibly judge moots, he adds is always open to suggestions and possibilities for improvement. “Ask students to get me a list [of judges who know international law] - I will contact them and we will send invites.”
And ultimately the proof is in the pudding, according to Ravichandran. “Time and again we have proved all the teams we have selected reached the quarters or second or third round at Jessup. The selection process is [therefore] correct. One team out of luck or a good draw maybe - earlier it has happened, they had a good draw of a medium level team, so they went to Jessup and they were unable to fare well there, they lost in the second round itself. But in the last four or five years, our teams have got respect even among US teams, so they’re doing excellently.”
Check back later this week for the full interviews with the mooters who will represent Indian colleges at Jessup this year.
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1. Winning in a moot involves luck. There's no two ways about it.
2. International law and domestic law are vastly different areas to have expertise in and you can't "teach" the basics of international law in exactly 15 minutes if you're also expected to make intricate legal arguments at the same time. In such situations it becomes a high school debate with more marks going to the more eloquent, whether or not they have good arguments or have done their research.
Personally, having been "beaten" by teams who had about 5 footnotes in the whole memorial, had done little research on most arguments and did not know the first thing of international law in a Surana moot, I will take Mr. Ravichandran's claims with a bucketful of salt.
And to the claims of all the teams advancing to the advanced rounds of Jessup... INCORRECT. CLC last year did not qualify. Symbiosis the year before that did not qualify. They did not lose in the "second round", because there is no such thing. They did not break. And it takes some doing to fail to make a break of 24 (this year it's now 32) out of 120.
The teams which really do India proud at DC are NLS and Nalsar. This is an objective fact. NLS - at least the quarters last three years running, and at least the round of 16 the last ten years. Nalsar - Semis twice now. So perhaps you understand why it's a big thing when these teams lose at Nationals, and why it matters.
Please go and analyze and assimilate these two phrases. You should seriously stop learning law (Every body knows you are really good at it) for sometime and in fact take these two phrases as your entire semester subjects (i know these are very difficult subjects for you but still please try).
"Classic case of how N-Schools Display their "EGO" if they loose.
Though funny, it is also very disturbing because it shows what kind of students N-Schools are producing. To put it in the words of The commission, appointed by the Chief Justice of India, "NLS has moved away from the phase of 'exploration and accomplishment' to a 'phase of diminution and dissatisfaction'.
It's high time N-Schools Stop thinking about how much law they are teaching and start contemplating as to what kind of people it is contributing to the profession."
P.S- Apologies to the person who actually wrote the comment.
90% of them must have come from team members of team who lost.
also sad to see an NUJS student refusing to criticize the moot considering the ridiculous decisions Suarana has taken against NUJS in the past.
nls/nalsar/nujs/nluj jessup mooters have freely and openly criticised surana's management of the jessup nations for YEARS now, REGARDLESS of the rank obtained in the competition itself, and they've all done rather well in general as everyone knows. they are old enough to realise that whether they happen to win or lose it, it is still a crapfest.
that is why the older colleges' teams look upon the national rounds as a necessary evil, a gamble to be somehow pushed through so that they can get to the real deal in the US. nobody is under the misconception that the national rounds are in any way an arbiter of quality mooting.
the younger colleges all have great mooters too, and no doubt will carry the flame forward, but it is incorrect and unfair to the older colleges to quickly pin all their criticism on 'jealousy'. they really don't have to be jealous. nujs has the unique distinction of having won vienna (twice?), nluj won both jessup and stetson north last year, and nalsar, nls...well res ipsa loquitor, really.
this is not a case of college-based parochialism. it is an angry call for quality in a moot whose name stands for exactly that. in fact, there is an excellent chance that the younger colleges who happen to have won this time around, would have criticised the judging for an older-NLU bias if they hadn't.
it would do everyone good to pay attention to both sides of the argument in fairness.
Let me also clarify that I do not seek to get involved in the controversy over what specifically happened at this year's Nationals. I was not there at the Nationals, and am therefore in no position to comment upon the manner in which they were conducted.
Since this post seems to be about constructive suggestions with respect to improving the Nationals, however, I do have the following suggestions:
1. There is a large pool of lawyers who have recently done the Jessup, and done well at it. From the last four NLS teams, I know at least six ex-students who are in India, and two who will be coming back shortly. I'm sure the position is the same as far as Nalsar, NUJS, or other Universities are concerned. This means that there is a fairly large pool of experienced lawyers, who may at least be approached about judging. If even a few of them agree to spare the weekend and judge, it will improve quality no end. The same should be done with respect to the memorials. This is because it is quite true that judging an International Law moot requires an entirely different orientation than judging municipal law. Therefore, a judge eminently suited to adjudicating a domestic law moot may perhaps not be the ideal person to have on the bench for Jessup or Stetson.
2. The break round pairings currently happen through a draw of lots. This may - and on occasion, has - led to two strong teams facing each other, and one knocking the other out. A far more equitable system - and indeed, the system ILSA recommends - is to have reverse power matching (1 v. 8, 2 v. 7) for the break rounds. This would ensure that as far as possible, the two best teams do advance to the finals. One way to ensure this even further is to have four prelim rounds - as opposed to two (again, something that ILSA recommends) - which will almost certainly guarantee that the two best teams in the competition do end up as 1 - 2 after the prelims.
These are just my two cents on how to eliminate possible loopholes from the way in which the Nationals are conducted, and prevent controversies of such a nature from cropping up again. It is important that people who give three months of their life to the Jessup should not go away feeling - rightly or wrongly - that they have been robbed or cheated. Slight tweaks in the current process may go a long way towards achieving that.
The opinions of the people referred to in the articles, in sum, state that judging is not bad and people who are losing are blaming the judges.
Those are opinions. I have my own as well. But I'm going to leave them out. I do have some facts, however.
I urge everyone to answer the following questions, which in turn would objectively reflect on the quality of the National Rounds in India:
1.The ILSA National Rules state that there must be a mandatory minimum of 4 prelim rounds. Surana has only 2. A violation, it seems.
2.The ILSA National Rules state that memo marks must be counted in the break rounds (which is done in the International rounds as well). In India, the organizers don't count memo marks post break. How?
The next couple of questions reflect on the quality of judging. They aren’t my opinion, but facts.
1.Last year, the NLS memo was the 4th best in South India (not even India, mind you. But South India). And NALSAR came out second. In the Internationals, NLS was second best in the world, and NALSAR did not figure in the top 20. Unless south India produced insanely good memos, better than the rest of the world, how is this possible? What exactly do they mark on? What are the memo judges?
2.The year before last, in the National Rounds, NLS got the 8th best memo in India, and the 7th best in the world. Again. How?
The following questions, unlike the previous ones, are based on facts, but not verifiable at this moment (and so obviously, people will deny them). But nonetheless.
1.This year, in the Semis of the South Rounds, ILS passed material to the bench (which is strictly prohibited under ILSA Rules). Let that be, they did so AFTER sur-rebuttal. A similar thing was done in the South India finals last year. Any comments?
2.Last years South India rounds were judged by a Geography Teacher in Madras University. I won’t name the person in a public forum. But is this acceptable?
3.The year before last, in the National Rounds, the finals were recorded. I wonder if anyone has seen the video and can then truly comment that national judging is of good quality? Espcially when a judge responds to an ICJ case (North Sea Continental Shelf, a supremely important ICJ case), with the words ‘oh yes. Supreme Court judgment. I know’. And I’m quoting him.)
The first two sets of questions are based on verifiable facts. So I request you, and any and all readers to not question the facts, but answer the questions.
I request everyone to limit your ‘investigation’ to facts and not opinions of mooters which are unverifiable. If that is the case, having done Jessup myself, I can say (and I’m sure I can find several others from a host of colleges), with the utmost sincerity, that the Nationals judging quality is pathetic.
If you really want to get to the bottom of this, apart from the facts I’ve mentioned above, you could:
1.Get videos of the rounds/finals.
2.Get a list of judges who judged post break rounds, with their credentials in IL.
Either will confirm my argument.
Finally, this is not about which team won and lost, and neither does this reflect on the quality of those teams. I’m sure the teams who won were good (let that be!). The question is whether merit mattered, and mattered as much as it should. Many other good (and possibly better) teams have lost out because of bad judging. So, I request people to not be parochial about this and argue along college lines, saying my college is better than yours – which is something, I’m extremely sad to say, LegallyIndia is unabashedly promoting.
I'm not making self-interested arguments here. Like I said, I won the nationals (and I'm still saying it's extremely bad judging). I'm asking everyone to answer these questions on merit.
if you lose fairly, dont compain ... but if people lose like this ... under these organizational standards ... then keeping quiet and 'accepting defeat' is stupid and cowardly ...
and please use your names. if you are so principled - then use your names like everyone is and dont hide youself ...
Why don't you answer Raag's questions before commenting on the low character standards of students produced by other colleges?
at the out set let me confess that i am not from any big branded law schools. please pardon my mistakes. But i have a very simple(Non N-School level)doubt.
Why dint you show your immaculate and leeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeenghty drafting skills and question the standards of Judging "openly on Legallyindia" when you won the competition??
For your information i am also posting the article which declared the results of last year south-Indian round.
www.legallyindia.com/20100203458/Mooting/nlsiu-back-on-top-of-mpl-season-arch-rival-nalsar
In the world rounds NLSIU lost in quarters but NALSAR reached semis.
If Nalsar lost to you in south Indian finals they must have lost before quarterfinals(where you lost) in world rounds.(How did they reach semi finals?)
so applying your own logic NLSIU rigged the last year jessup south indian round.
Do you understand that a difference between a QF and an SF is one round? Any good team can lose one round before for a variety of factors - facing better opposition, having a 2% off day or anything. FYI, the NLS speaker scores were much higher than Nalsar's.
On the other hand, getting 4th best memo in South India (with 10 15 colleges taking part), and 2nd best in the world (with 600 colleges taking apart, and the world's elite) shows a gross mismatch, which is of a totally different order.
It is unbelievable that such things need to be spelt out for people to get them.
Precisely my point too.
You can never judge on a exact basis what happens in Indian rounds and what happens in world rounds.
As you stated "any team can loose based on variety of factors" and to 'what extent' these factors matter is very objective.
You sound like a small school child who is crying for 1st rank in his second grade based on his 1st rank in his first grade.(he may get a 1st rank or a second rank or altogether fail)
If you can't see the basic difference between the two examples, then all power to you. Also, you've still failed to respond to a majority of Raag's points (not that you've responded properly to anything, but let that be).
Have you lost it or what? 1st rank in first grade and second grade... you do understand that it's the SAME memo which is checked, right? The SAME MEMORIAL. I'll say it for a third time. It's the SAME MEMORIAL. Which is why the huge discrepancy needs to be taken into account. Have you ever done an international moot in your life?
But there is this word in English called "ANALOGY"."A-N-A-L-O-G-Y".(i hope N-School people know the meaning of it)
At the cost of repeating myself - it is not my purpose here to create controversy, or impugn anyone's competence or character. This is a post on the way in which Jessup Nationals are organised. My comment contains a few suggestions about improving status quo. Nothing more, nothing less.
Why didn't I complain about the judging last year, after my team won the Nationals? Well, to state the point yet again, my comment above isn't a complaint - it merely contains a couple of suggestions. However, since nobody seems to be willing to accept that, two brief reasons: first, LegallyIndia was not a site that I was in the habit of visiting (it still isn't), and the MPL was something I knew of only through my friends. Secondly, I never came across any forum - a website, or a post - which was dedicated to discussing judging and organisation of the Jessup Nationals. As I've said above, it is not my purpose to court controversy. I do not see the point of starting a quarrel on, for instance, a results post that my anonymous friend so kindly provided the link to above. I was told that there is a post on LegallyIndia discussing the specific issue of Jessup Nationals' organisation and judging. As someone who has gone through the process, I thought that I was in a fair position to provide a few inputs.
In conclusion therefore, I have no axe to grind with anyone. If anyone wishes to engage with the substantive points I've put forward, I'm happy to discuss it, since we can at least agree on this much (I hope), that improving the organisation of the Jessup Nationals is a desirable thing. I do request, however, that personal attacks (especially anonymous ones) be kept out of this.
i am extremely sorry to address the question commonly to 12 and 13.
The question was to gentlemen at 13.
Your teammate who followed you who accused personally various colleges.
Why dint you post the same questions on the last years article which declared you as winners??
LUCK DOES PLAY A MAJOR ROLE IN MOOTING.
SHAME ON LI WHO ARE SERVING THE VESTED INTEREST OF NLSIU
P.S. even if this post doe not get published atleast LI knows what people think about it
I was a part of the team that won Jessup North last year. In spite of having probably the second lowest memorial scores in the National Rounds, we won it because of the brilliance of a certain speaker on our team. In the national rounds, we mooted against teams which went on to win memorial awards. The winning memos had arguments which on reading the bench memorandum (released months later) you'd know are definitely wrong! Come to think of it, NLS whose memorial was ranked 4th worldwide didnt find a place in the domestic memorial awards. Something's wrong?
It is frustrating to see judges buying semi dubious arguments. But in all fairness to them, what do you expect? There is something that is fundamentally wrong in the way the oral rounds and the memorials are judged and I dont blame Surana for it. The only solution to bad judgding is that ILSA should provide the National Round judges with a bench memorandum and prohibit the holding of any national round before the bench memorandum is prepared.
Last year despite my team not making it to the international round, I said the judging was not bad. So, this comment is not motivated by my making it to the international round this year.
The full comment read as sent to LI and will be published by LI soon in a separate interview reads:
"Having spent some time in the mooting circuit, I do have some views on judging standards. When teams lose and blame it on judging, it is to be taken with a pinch of salt. At the very outset, I should clarify that we lost to NLU Delhi in the finals because they were better than us in that court and conspiracy theories to the contrary are unfounded.
But it is true that the tendency of getting judges or lawyers from domestic courts (including the High Courts and the Supreme Court) to judge moots in international law does compromise the quality of the mooting experience. While they are eminent persons and best possible judges for a domestic law moot, that is not the case for an international law moot, given the difference in the way the two legal frameworks function. A solution may be mandating that the national round of an international moot be judged only by those who have participated in that international moot or similar moots in the past. While this may exclude celebrity judges, quality will be assured.
Coming specifically to Jessup, I met some really good judges. There were also some who kept repeating 'what international document deals with that?' every five minutes to create the impression of an active and knowledgeable bench. However, the good judges would certainly score a huge majority. It is commendable that RMLNLU and Surana have overcome the limitations of a nascent law school like RMLNLU and a non-metro city like Lucknow to put together such a wonderful show. It would be unfair to point out a few instances of sub-optimal judging and ignore the overall quality of it."
Yours,
Deepak Raju
Someone's written that I 'accused colleges personally'. This is what I wrote then: 'Finally, this is not about which team won and lost, and neither does this reflect on the quality of those teams. I’m sure the teams who won were good'. I think that's pretty clear that I'm not going after any colleges! That is something I'm in no position to comment upon.
I had raised 6 questions. Till now, people have said that I'm biased and self-interested. And why I didn't do anything last year when I won the south rounds.
I'm going to answer those questions directly, in the hope that some of you (who still remain anonymous) will give the same treatment of my questions.
I won South India rounds. So for me to say that the judging at those rounds is bad is against my interest. For the Nationals, we were told to 'dumb our arguments down'. I won the rounds not because of merit, but despite that.
Second, people have said that at the end of the day, mooting is about convincing the person sitting across you. So, if I put a chartered accountant on the bench, that would be ok. It would then be about how best you can convince the person who happens to be a CA. Clearly not. It's about convincing the person sitting across, whose understanding of the law is as good as yours or hopefully, superior.
Finally, why did I not do anything when I won last year? In Washington, as also in Turkey later that year at the ILSA Conference, I personally raised objections and spoke to Bill Patterson, the ILSA Executive Director. I didn't write anything on Legally India. Yes. Like Gautam said, I didn't frequent LegallyIndia at the time - the site being much less popular at the time.
Judging is far from a perfect art. And there is a dearth of IL people in India. You can't reasonably expect judges at Nationals to know every peculiarity of the law that the Jessup compromis deals with. Agreed. My point tends to the other extreme. That the judges are pathetic, know absolutely nothing of IL, and ask ridiculously stupid questions. Speaking at nationals involves dumbing your arguments down so that these judges can understand. I don't think that's how it should be.
See. I'm not against any college. If I was, I won't be stupid enough to post this publicly with my name. I have one point to make, and only one. Judging in the nationals is a joke. I have given facts, and asked six questions in support. I ask everyone to please answer them, since I've returned the favour.
Assume I'm biased, that I've written everything in self-interest, and all that this good society of ours considers evil. Assume you don't buy my reasons for writing this.
Even then, that doesn't take away any merit from the questions I've raised. They stand nonetheless, and I request everyone, yet again, to answer them.
My alleged ulterior motives and Jessup judging quality possess no cosmic connection that I'm aware of.
So you were told to "dumb your arguments down". Dont you think other teams also might have followed the same strategy for national orals. So, May be for a random listener they may have sounded bad in law but may be a part of a plan to convince the "so called pathetic judges" in national round.
And the part where you and gautham said you are not frequent visitors to LI.....i can only say one thing. When you are embarrassed and lying don't make it so obvious.
After the international rounds, do take the time to post the rankings of each of the teams that qualified... I think we will get our answers...
We do need an alternate forum to host the national rounds of Jessup and Stetson.. all in favour say AYE...
I don't accept the fact that I raise my voice when we lose only. I said 'assume' so that you would answer my questions instead of deflecting attention to my motives. In any case, if you had read through my previous post, I explained that I, in fact, DID raise my voice even when I won last year. Seriously. Please read, at least.
And exactly. Dumbing arguments down is bad. I'm not concerned with what other teams do. That's what I wrote in my first post. Again, please read! My problem is that even if everyone dumbs their arguments down (which, in any case, is markedly different from making WRONG arguments) that's a bad practice - one we should seek to change. If judges are bad, and every team is lowering their quality to meet their, that is a bad thing.
Two things. One, I again request everyone to state their name. And secondly, my entire post (the one previous to this) said that assume I'm a self-interested idiot, and urged you to just answer the questions. No one has done that. You're still questioning my integrity, and letting my questions go unanswered.
My point is not to say any team is bad or that NLS is the best or question anyone's integrity. I'm saying judging is bad, which, I hope, is a common concern for all. I've provided evidence of that, which has not been refuted by anyone. I take that as an admission?
First of all, I think it's great that some mooters are confident enough to write in their own name and others should follow their example.
If someone does write in their own name, please respect that and keep name-calling to a minimum, and do not question their motives or whether they are a regular Legally India reader or not - that should not matter.
As a rule of thumb, please think about whether you would feel comfortable telling a person face-to-face what you are writing here.
Abusing other "Anonymous Guests" is another story of course and is pretty much up to everyone concerned.
But it does seem like some valid points have been made, and if some genuine discussion on these can take place we'd be happy to take a consensus or interesting suggestions back to Surana to improve the moot in future years.
Best wishes and happy mooting,
Kian
Coming to the question of Judging, I believe that for a prestigious Moot like Jessup, you should have Judges who knows International Law, who are dealing with International Law in their everyday life. When you have plethora of Legal Officers of the Legal and Treaties Division of the Ministry of External Affairs, Legal Officers of ICRC, AALCO and other UN Bodies in India who has done their specialization on International Law, why go in for Lawyers who are practicing in the High Courts as Judges??? With all due respect to the Judges (who are claimed to be former Jessup Mooters), I believe by merely going to a moot like Jessup, Vis, or Dunant does not make you an authority of International Law so that you can can start judging an event like the Philip C Jessup Moot.
Coming to this year's judging, although as i said earlier that some of the judges were just brilliant (at least they were asking pertinent questions unlike the rest who just wanted to interrupt the speakers with some stupid/irrelevant questions), the most shocking part was when in the Quarter Finals the judges in one of the bench accepted some fundamentally incorrect arguments from the team which eventually won the round. The team even went on to argue that the "United Nation Security Council Resolution prevails over Jus Cogen Norm" (someone who has just started reading International Law would not make such a Statement) and to our surprise the Judges accepted the argument. The team was not even allowed to rebutt the argument as they were specifically instructed to only answer the questions posed by the Applicant Team. Now in that round the Bench comprised of Lawyers from the High Court, SC and an Associate of some Firm who has never been to Jessup!!!
Anyways I believe NUJS Kolkata was anyday the better team in the finals of the North Round and I wish them good luck for the World Finals.
I think Surana needs to work on the Judging part very carefully from next year onwards. The question is not about winning, losing and complaining after losing but the only thing is to send the best team from India and for that you need experts to Judge the events.
AYE......
I soo damn agree with you on your suggestion!!
Since you were able to speak to Mr. Ravichandran, you could perhaps get him to answer my questions and any others raised in the preceding posts? They're only questions, and the answers would go a long way in determining the quality of judging (and accordingly, whether something needs to be done or not).
I can prove most of the facts I've stated, so I don't see Surana & Surana denying them. But to get an answer on record would be nice.
The finals of the year before last were also recorded. Perhaps you could request him for the video and put it up - for people to judge themselves as to the quality of judging?
Cheers,
Raag
Thank you for that much-needed bit of moderating. I've provided my suggestions above, but let me flesh out the first in a bit of detail.
1. Judging - As somebody pointed out above, the best type of judge for this is somebody who has been to, and performed well at, the Jessup Internationals. A major part of the reason why the judging is so brilliant at the Internationals is because the pool consists largely of ex-Jessupers who are passionate about the moot, passionate about IL, and willing and eager to judge - a combination with which you can't go wrong. In our first prelim round last year, for instance, we were judged by Vince Levi, who had won the Jessup in 2006, and won best speaker. In almost every round, at least one - and sometimes two - judges were ex-Jessupers.
Now, as I pointed out above, the same is true for India. At the cost of repetition, I know that all three members of the 2007 team (Octo-finals, DC) are in India; all three members of the 2008 team (Semi-finals, DC) are in India; two members of the 2009 team (Quarter-finals, DC) are currently abroad, but will soon be returning to India. In addition, I have met members of the 2003 team (Octo-finals, DC), 1998 team (Quarter-finals, DC) and 1997 team (Semi-finals, DC), who are also practicing in India. The purpose of this is not to boast about NLS's record at Jessup. It's simply to show that there is a large pool of experienced ex-Jessup mooters, who have done well at the Internationals, in India. Once you add to this Nalsar, NUJS, NLU, ILS etc. and their alumni, you'll get an abundance of riches to choose from. Of course, most of these people are no doubt very busy, and will probably decline to come. But there's no harm in asking, and even a few of them present and judging will improve quality exponentially. I'm sure NLS would be happy to provide the organisers the contact details of these people, if they're unable to get it themselves, and I'm sure other Universities would be happy to do the same.
Furthermore, it has been argued that there is a dearth of IL scholars in India - so we have to get High Court judges and municipal lawyers to judge the Nationals. With respect, I believe that this is not entirely accurate. In my third year, I had occasion to watch the semi-finals of the Manfred Lachs funding round at NLS. As everyone present in that room will testify, the judging was outstandingly good. I do not recall the substantive questions, but I do recall this priceless vignette:
Speaker: As the late Prof. X has argued... (Prof. X being a world-renowned authority on the issue)
Judge: Are you sure Prof. X has passed away, agent? He seemed in good health when I met him last month!
Unfortunately, I do not know who these judges were. Additionally, the final was judged by Prof. V.S. Mani, who is an IL scholar of international repute, having lectured at the Hague Academy. The point is, that there are enough top-class IL scholars in India. We just need to make the effort of finding them.
A combination of such scholars and Jessup almuni would ensure that there will never be any complaints about judging again. It's not overly difficult to achieve, and even if we can't do everything at one go, we can at least make a start, and improve step-by-step.
2. Organisation - I've already made this point in detail above. Four prelim rounds and reverse power matching would ensure that the best teams in the tournament are kept apart till as late as possible, something which I think we can all agree is a good thing for India!
May be some statistics will help. Among the 10 judges I faced before the final round, 1 was BAD, 1 was "not so good", 6 were "good" and 2 were "brilliant". There are two caveats here though. (i) i am not saying these judges were qualified to judge the international round of jessup; i am keeping in mind that this is a national round and has its own limitations; (ii) this is my subjective opinion. But having been to 8 moots and worked on the organisation of 5, I have seen quite a bit of moot judging and have complained very vocally when I was genuinely of the opinion that judging was bad.
Deepak
If you are making such snide comments at a university, which is doing so well then you need to let us know the trusted source of yours.
Prof Ranbir singh knows more people than anyone on this planet perhaps, but how many of tHese come and judge the rounds of moot court competitions. If you do not know stuff i would recommend that you keep ur information to urself.
IF Prof Singh only had to ensure our victories he would not have waited for Three years, but would have started doing that since the first year...
Being smart when you know nothing.
Please cheek the event records of MPL only, As i dnt expect you to have good researching skills as you are j ust quoting a 'trusted source'...
NLU Delhi, finished runners up at Henry dunant
Finished first in the hidyatullah moot
Finished first in the law asia moot
Finished first in the jessups national rounds
Finished first in the leaden sarin moot court internal rounds...
Finished runners up in k.k.luthra
Finished third in BRSawhney...
And this is use for this year.....
Lasst year
We finished first in DMHarish
Finished first in LEIDEN Sarin India rounds and third in International round..one of our students is also doing his masters in Leiden on a scholarship
Now how many of These have judges from the SC... Grow up man and concentrate more on performing rather than criticizing or raising insane allegations against prof. Singh or NLU Delhi..
We work hard man... And hence perform...I would recommend u also work hard and lose the tag of underperforming college, Nd concentrate on mootingnbut rather than spending time with this friend of urs.
My comments above were directed solely to this year's judging (as opposed to Jessup National Rounds judging).
Secondly, we were probably lucky to have good benches throughout. Anyway, these are the judges whose names I remember. Of course, you can accuse me of selective quoting, but these are all I remember.
1. Shaunak Kashyap
2. Rishabh Sancheti
3. Jasmeet Singh
4. Vaibhav Sharma
5. Prof. of Int'l law from Lucknow Uni(whose name I do not know)
why where no ex-jessupers there??? int'l rounds have almost only ex-jessupers ..
akshay says - 'lucky to have good benches' - he's admitting it. you need to be lucky to have good judges. thats not how this should work right ....
The chain reaction of discussions is as a result of NLS failing to qualify and NALSAR losing the Finals.. Its high time, all of you realise that ILS has a strong mooting standards.. the qualifying rounds in ILS are highly competitive.. I had the opportunity to follow ILS qualifying rounds as I had participated too (I studied 1st year at ILS and then, moved to N-School after qualifying CLAT..) The college is known to produce top quality mooters and remember, they had Jessup, BCIT and Vienna into their display-ware already, its only now that the N-Schools have started to win these moots.. the qualifying moots always saw a strength of 400-500 students participate.. and only 12 students qualify for the Finals.. So, ILS inevitably produces the best Mooters, who work with a lot of dedication and focus, and ofcourse, the students are known to be very good at their presentation of arguments and tackling the bench of Judges.. ILS is known to produce top quality mooters, and a good examples are Mr.Pratik Awasthi who won BCIT and Mr. N. Ashwani Kumar who won Jessup, ULC and Raj Anand, and later Vienna winner Ms.Shraddha Deshmukh, who performed outstandingly well at Vienna.. I am personally winess to when Ashwani Kumar and Pratik Awasthi were arguing, the Moot Hall used to be full to its capacity.. The professors and lecturers always take the names of Pratik and Ashwani Kumar as benchmarks, and as good mooters and role-models to emulate. Infact, Mr. Ashwani Kumar, regularly judges the Jessup and Stetson Rounds, and the feed-back is just brilliant, he is supposed to be a brilliant judge...... Pratik and Ashwani Kumar won BCIT and Jessup against all odds.. ILS does not hold a good infrastructural set-up for the Mooting students to prepare unlike the other N-Law Schools.... inspite of all the hurdles, ILS performs astoundingly well braving all odds and stumbling factors as they have to research on a strict budget unlike N-Law Schools which shower the students with funds for moots like Jessup and Stetson...... Many a times, I regret moving over from ILS.. as the student atmosphere is very healthy and supportive.. Hearty Congratulations to ILS Team for winning Jessup and am sure you would do very well.... Keep flying the ILS Flag high..... Just add the details.. Mr. N. Ashwani Kumar is into litigation, practising at the High Court of Andhra Pradesh, Hyderabad with the Advocate General of the State, and Mr. Pratik Awasthi is working with the United Nations at New York..
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