Like medical, law students to work in rural areas: SC judge
India Today
Supreme Court Judge UU Lalit said that now law students will be required to visit taukas to create awareness and provide quality legal aid to the people.
Medical students complete a mandatory internship in rural areas. Likewise, law students will also have to follow the same process. "Like medical professionals, who have to do a mandatory internship in rural areas, now law students will also be required to visit talukas to create legal awareness and provide quality legal aid to the people, Supreme Court judge UU Lalit said on Saturday.
Justice Lalit, while addressing judges, lawyers, and legal services providers at a state-level conference "Early Access to Justice at Pre-Arrest, Arrest and Remand Stage", appealed for opening the doors of legal aid for unrepresented persons by giving quality legal aid services. He also said he has been in touch with the Bar Council of India in this regard.
"I have been telling them to make it part of your curriculum at LLB level and this I said just a few days back, we have courses like medicine, where after a person graduates, he gives it back to society by serving as an internship in rural areas, correct!
Why not with a legal professional? Why is it that the service of rural areas is the prerogative and preserve only of medical professionals," asked Justice Lalit, who is also executive chairman of National Legal Services Authority (NALSA).
Justice Lalit, who is the senior-most judge after the Chief Justice of India, said, "So we should adopt that, as a principle, when it comes to legal education. This is what I have been advocating.
I have been stressing this to the Bar Council of India and they have agreed, from the 3rd year onwards, they will be regularly sending students. Every law college sends the law students to nearby talukas, so that as young students, as young professionals, they have first-hand experience..."
