DISCUSSION ON ACCESS TO JUSTICE – ROLE AND RESPONSIBILITY OF STUDENT LEGAL AID CELLS

The Legal Services Clinic (LSC) of the National Law School India University (NLSIU) offers legal and paralegal services to those who are less privileged and thus have limited access to the official machinery for grievance redressal. Similar student legal aid cells are functional in other colleges as well. Such clinics are very famous in the United States of America and have helped countless numbers of socially and economically backward persons to better utilise the existing administrative and judicial machinery. Such a cell also helps the students develop their lawyering skills and inculcates a sense of responsibility. In the Indian context, we feel that these legal aid cells have a lot of unexplored potential in enabling better access to justice

LSC will be releasing a module on criminal law that is completely authored and illustrated by various students of NLSIU, past and present. The module seeks to explain the law in a simple fashion so that even people without a legal background would be able to understand and appreciate the law, and more importantly, be able to use it in their day to day lives. LSC also plans to launch its website at this function.

In this regard, LSC plans to host an hour-long discussion on the role of student-run legal aid cells in India. This round-table discussion brings together members of the Judiciary, members of the current as well as past committees and lawyers on the pro bono panel of LSC and hopes to obtain a holistic view on the role that has been played by various student legal aid cells and the role that can be played in the future. The main questions that the discussion seeks to answer are the following:

1. Should there be legal recognition for members of student legal aid cells to appear before a Court of law?

2. Is there a formal way they can assist the members of the legal aid board panel/prosecutors/Govt. pleaders etc.

3. Can they make amicus submissions and third party interventions in certain important cases?

4. What are the ethics that members of student-run legal aid cells should follow? Is there a necessity for a written code of ethics?

5. How can legal-aid cells use ADR methods effectively?

6. How can there be an effective link between student legal aid cells and various state institutions like the KSLSA, Lok Adalats, Mediation Centre etc.

The discussion seeks to answer these questions and also seeks to set the debate on the role that student-run legal aid cells should play in India. In this regard, we seek to invite all law colleges with a legal-aid cell or those who plan to start a legal aid cell to share their experiences and concerns by participating in the discussion.

For more details, please contact LSC at the email addresses below:

lsc at nls dot ac dot in

lsc dot nlsiu at gmail dot com