Introducing CLIF

The Current Legal Issues Forum (CLIF) is an initiative at the National Law School, Bangalore, for providing a platform to discuss, debate, analyse and critique legal developments of contemporary importance. While the Forum is being setup mainly for the benefit of NLS students, it welcomes and actively solicits inputs on the blog from NLS students who are not part of the Forum, from other members of the NLS community, and from anyone interested in the topics we are discussing. Your views and opinions will enrich the quality and content of our deliberations.

The Forum will meet once a week for a 2-hour session to discuss topics and readings assigned for that session. The topic for each week’s discussion will be decided the previous week and a group of students will be assigned the task of leading discussions. Students can either sign up to be graded for one-credit, or can audit some or all sessions without grading. The Forum will meet every Thursday between 4:00–6:00 p.m. Where possible, the Forum will invite other Faculty members and outside experts to speak on the issue under discussion.

This blog has been set up for facilitating Forum discussions, and to carry the conversation beyond the class-room. Readings for each session will be posted on this blog. Given the number of people who have expressed interest in the Forum, each week’s topic will have to be assigned to a group of students who will have to divide up responsibilities between them. The group of students responsible for a week’s reading will post on this blog issues for discussion by 5:00 p.m. on the Tuesday of that week. The group will also be responsible for initiating and leading discussions at that session. By Friday evening, the group will post on the blog, a write-up on that week’s readings, a summary of the class discussions, and their own views (individual or collective) on the subject.

Since students will be working as a group, they will be expected to read beyond the assigned material for the week for which they are responsible. They should be familiar with the most important legal developments on the topic of discussion and should know the important previous cases, statutory measures, reports, etc on the area of their responsibility. Students will be graded as a group for the presentation component of the course. As far as possible we will try forming groups such that they cut across batches. Each registered student has to be involved in leading discussions and writing up on ONE session of the Forum.

The evaluation scheme will be as follows:

1. Discussion and Write up (comprising issues for discussion, leading classroom discussions, and final write up): 80 (graded as a group)

2. Class Participation: 15

3. Attendance: 5

4. Total: 100

Students interested in participating in the Forum for credit are requested to sign up with the Exam Dept.