“Your honour, were you in love during campus days?”
For the panel of five sitting judges of the Kerala High Court — V.K. Mohanan, P.R. Ramachandra Menon, C.K. Abdul Rahim, A.M. Shaffique, and P.V. Asha — that question was perhaps a first.
While Justice Mohanan used it as a ploy to tease their hostess, Lovely Paulose, the Principal of Government Law College, Justice Ramachandra Menon lamented his bad luck at not having an affair while on campus.
The breezy interaction between judges and law students at the centre hall of the Government Law College on Saturday assumed significance since all the five judges and their hostess Ms. Paulose had graduated from the same batch of 1979-82.
Incidentally, the centre hall was their final year classroom.
A student’s wish of revisiting the judges’ campus days that were free of internal assessment and mandatory attendance was met with thunderous applause. Justice Rahim said he had all 24 papers pending at the end of three years, which he cleared in two lots.
“But the present system seems to have an edge over the one that prevailed during our college days as it better equips students professionally,” he said.
Pat came the reply when asked what advice they would give to aspiring lawyers, “Learn the case thoroughly.” Justice Mohanan said there was widespread complaint in the judicial fraternity that young lawyers did not bother to study the case inside out.
