The adjudication of the final round of the IICLAM Moot between NLU Jodhpur and School of Law, Christ University, Bangalore ended in a tie after judges could not decide on a single deserving winner.
NLU Jodhpur speaker Prianka Mohan said that the final round result was surprising. “We honestly didn’t expect a tie. It was a well-balanced out finals. We thought that the other side had done a little better. Ironically, we had also faced them in the first round of the moot.”
However, NLU Jodhpur was later declared the ultimate victor after moot organisers used the memorandum scores as a tie-breaker. This lets NLU J start its MPL season with a bang earning 15 points from this tier 4 National Challenger moot.
Christ University also put up an equally impressive show earning a total of 16 points as it finished as runner-up in the moot and its speaker Kishore Kumar took home the best speaker award.
GLC Mumbai continued its good start to this season’s MPL, bagging 8 points for the best memorandum award.
Symbiosis Law School, Pune and KLE Bangalore finished as semi-finalists in the moot.
The problem was based on arbitration and infrastructure law and was hosted by NLU Delhi and organised by Kaden Boriss, National University of Singapore and Singapore International Arbitration Centre.
The NLU Jodhpur team consisted of speakers Prianka Mohan and Shreya Munoth along with researcher Alokita Basu.
Mohan told Legally India that she appreciated the quality of judging. “It was a very well organised Indian arbitration moot. The judges in the final round were very impressive and were well informed about the intricacies of the problem.
“They were not just people who were big names in every field, but they were experts in particular areas of law which the problem dealt with. One of the judges in semi-final round was extremely knowledgeable in Investment law.”
NLU Delhi moot court committee convenor Devna Arora said that the competition was very exciting and competitive. “Around 19 teams participated in the initial memorandum elimination round, out of which 16 teams were selected to participate in the oral rounds. The judges for the final rounds included Prof Jean Ho from NUS, Justice Sikri and senior advocate AK Ganguli.” [correction: the earlier version of this article erroneously referenced Justice Ganguly]
The Tier 5 international Maritime Moot which took place in early July this year is being considered with retrospectively, which makes it the first moot of Season 3 of the MPL. NLSIU Bangalore picked up the best overall memorandum and honourable mention for best respondent memo, giving it 12 points in the MPL 3.
MPL 3 Season Standings
Pos | Law school | Pts | Details |
1 | Campus Law Centre Delhi | 23 | Raj Anand Moot (gold, best speaker); |
2 | GLC Mumbai | 16 | [IICLAM] (best memo); Raj Anand Moot (silver); |
2 | School of Law, Christ University, Bangalore | 16 | [IICLAM] (silver, best speaker); |
4 | NLU Jodhpur | 15 | [IICLAM] (gold); |
5 | NLIU Bhopal | 12 | Raj Anand Moot (semis, best memo); |
5 | NLSIU Bangalore | 12 | [Maritime Arbitration Moot] (best overall memo, hon mention for best resp. memo)*; Raj Anand Moot (semis); |
7 | Symbiosis Law School, Pune | 4 | [IICLAM] (semis); |
7 | KLE Bangalore | 4 | [IICLAM] (semis); |
*The Maritime Moot which took place in early July this year is being considered with retrospectively, which makes it the first moot of Season 3 of the MPL.
Further proposed changes
Changelog version 3.03 of the MPL 3 competitions:
Frozen: The Oxford Media International moot rounds are now confirmed as a Tier 2 World Class moot. However, as a compromise, Oxford Media National qualifiers will remain in the National Challenger Tier 4 because it is still very new and similar to other moots in that tier such as NLS Arbitration, NUJS Herbert Smith, GIMC and KK Luthra.
The NLIU Juriscorp moot has been promoted to Tier 4 National Challengers, due to its popularity, quality in participation and judging.
Team MPL has also all but decided to promote DM Harish to World Class Tier 2 status because of its popularity as India’s best international moot and other factors such as excellent judging, quality participation, age and consistency.
BCI and qualifiers: There were suggestions to incorporate a separate lower tier for the North/South regional qualifying rounds for Jessup and Stetson, which were in the same tier as the BCI moot. Though there are good arguments that BCI has wider participation without a North/South split as the other Tier 3 qualifier moots, we also noted that most law schools send their best teams for Jessup/Stetson qualifiers and demoting those moots would not be wise.
There were also comments suggesting that if DMH were promoted, then other moots such as the BCI ought to be promoted. Though BCI is definitely India’s most popular national moot it didn’t see any international participation last year though the organisers intended an international presence and it therefore does not (yet) belong in the World Class tier. Also, judging quality at the BCI has been a little inconsistent recently.
Revolutionary new MPL points for organisers: We are also strongly mulling the idea of awarding points to law schools that organise moots. Such law schools are disadvantaged because that they lose the opportunity to score points in the moots which they host, thereby allowing other law schools to gain points. There are many moots which are hosted/organised by law schools, such as GLC Mumbai’s DM Harish and Nani Palkhiwala, Amity’s moot, GNLU’s GIMC, NLU Delhi’s IICLAM, NLSIU’s NLS Arbitration moot, the NUJS Herbert Smith, NLIU Bhopal Juriscorp, the HNLU Moot and many others where the hosting college misses out on winning MPL points.
We would therefore propose to automatically award MPL points to organising colleges equal to half the points awarded to semi-finalist teams in that moot, with figures rounded down. E.g.: a college organising a tier 5 moot would get 1 point; tier 4 organisers would get 2 points; tier 3 organising colleges (none at present) would also get 2; and tier 2 organisers would get 7 MPL points (only GLC Mumbai for DM Harish at present).
This recognises the contribution each moot makes to Indian mooting but first and foremost it redresses the effective penalty on colleges that organise top tier moots.
Team MPL welcomes your suggestions in the Moot discussion Legallypedia page and in the comments.
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'judging quality at the BCI has been a little inconsistent recently.'
in that case, any moot that surana organises should be the first booted out of whatever tier it may be in.
secondly: the idea of giving a college points for hosting is ridiculous. it is fully possible to win the MPL without participating in any one moot that the college may be hosting, if at all. the MPL is meant to award actual speaker/researcher effort.
thirdly: shreya munOth not munAth, thank you. (and i am not her)
NUJS did in fact participate at the Anand and Anand moot. They didn't break to semis though.
Think you might want to change that!
it is evident as the nluj team said that they faced eachother in the first round also. GOOD teams that faced weak teams in the prelims did not make it to the next round DESPITE WINNING the prelim rounds.
MPL will b mre exicting if dat is dne.
The judging quality at DMH is overall pretty good. I wouldn't think that any moot could boast of having great judges on ever bench and every round.
"Abysmal", however, would be the word I would use to describe your spelling prowess.
People are missing the point here! Neither are we concerned with the NLU tag nor do we want to discount it! I have one very simple thing to say and that is "Well Done Christ Law"
NLS 3/1
Nalsar 4/2
NUJS 5/1
NLS D 6/1
Other 20/1
Judges are unreasonable in one or two rounds in every moot. DMH is NO WHERE CLOSE TO BCI
Thanks for the comments. The unintentional error has now been rectified.
Cheers,
Prashanth
This seems to give an impression that DMH is better than BCI which is the most prestigious moot of India.
But reality is actually different and MPL team should rectify it.
BCIT should also be elevated; as it deserves so for undisputedly being the most prestigious moot of India.
I don't know if your policy provides for points for reaching semi-finals at Maritime International Arbitration or not, but if it does provide for points/any recognition for reaching semis at the moot, please update it accordingly.(NLS Bangalore reached semis in the event)
Also, tell me what is your procedure to recognize a moot with retrospective effect? On what grounds did you recognize Maritime with retrospective effect?
Thanks.
Thanks for the queries.
The Maritime arbitration moot is a Tier 5 international moot and the MPL does award points for semifinalists. You can check the scoring criteria here www.legallyindia.com/wiki/Mooting_Premier_League_2011-12_moot_court_competitions#Scoring_criteria
Yes, the results that were put up on the moot website did not disclose the semifinalists. We just contacted the NLS Moot Court Society convener who confirmed that the team from NLS finished semifinalists in the moot. Three more points will be awarded to NLS.
There is no clear cut procedure to recognize moots with retrospective effect. The reason why we considered Int'l Maritime Arbitration moot retrospectively is because the event occurs in early July/late June, after all the moots in the season end. We had considered the moot retrospectively during the last season too. The MPL season usually begins in August/Sept and goes on up till Apr/May. There are no other moots in June and July. Hence, instead of prematurely starting the new mooting season in July or by unnecessarily extending the previous season up till July, we usually consider the moot in the new season retrospectively.
Hope this helps!
Cheers,
Prashanth
Anything about BCI need not be said; everyone knoows its prestige!!!
By keeping the Oxford-India Moot in the tier four it basically means that the moot is similar to
Amity Moot Court Competition
IICLAM Moot
KLA Moot, Kerala
Nani Palkhiwala Tax Moot, GLC
NLIU Juris Corp Moot Court Competition
Raj Anand Moot Court Competition
Surana Corporate Moot
Surana International Technology Moot
Honestly I can't understand any logic in this. Even if the moot is new is that any criterion for not promoting it inspite of it having one of the best judging and organising.
If Juris Corp can be promoted after one edition why not Oxford.
The best and most fair thing would be to promote Oxofrd-India rounds and NUJS-Herbert smith to tier 3, considering that they are the 2 moots with the best quality of judging (which you dont often find in Indian Moots), organising and transperancy.
Please look inot the matter
please refer the above link! the current standings state (silver) for nls in maritime moot.. however university of southampton reached finals and not nls bangalore..
kindly take note!!
Thanks for pointing out.
The standings erroneously mentioned 'silver' instead of 'semis'. Sincere apologies for the inadvertent error.
The points awarded to the NLS team for their performance in the moot remain unchanged. The points are as follows:
1- Semis - 3 points
2- Best overall memo- 5 points
3- Honorable mention for best respondent memo - 3 points.
Total - 11 points
Initially, we had awarded only 8 points to them as the moot website did not mention the names of the semifinalists. But, pursuant to Comment 31 and confirmation from the NLS Moot Court Society, we awarded 3 more points to NLS for finishing semifinalists.
Hope this clears the confusion!
Thanks!
Cheers,
Prashanth
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