With the University of Kerala striving to comply with the government’s order for a uniform academic calendar, the outgoing batches have been bearing the brunt of a hectic examination schedule.
At the receiving end of a rather illogical schedule are the final-year students of the three-year Unitary LLB course who are set to appear for their fifth-semester regular examinations in December.
The plight of the students is such that they had to appear for four sets of regular examinations since December last year. The first semester’s supplementary examinations and viva voce for the third semester were also completed during the period. Worsening their woes, the students will also have to prepare for the fourth-semester viva voce that has been scheduled for November 20 and 21.
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Strangely, the university, which failed to conduct any examinations for over a year since the start of the classes for the 2017-20 batch in October 2017, has been on an examination spree of late. The examinations for the first semester were held from December 2018 to January 2019.
Portions not completed
“The lopsided schedule has left us in dire straits. Only less than half of the portions could be completed as we were denied a reasonable number of class days,” said Gokul P. Raj, class representative of the final-year LLB batch at Government Law College, Thiruvananthapuram.
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He pointed out that the conduct of the course also contravened the stipulations laid down by the Bar Council of India. The norms mandated 360 hours to be dedicated for in-class lectures, whereas 90 hours should be ensured for tutorials, moot court room, seminars, and so on. However, the batch only received 103 hours of lecture sessions during the fourth semester and 24 hours during the fifth semester thus far, the student claimed.
The university has turned down their repeated requests to postpone the examinations, citing the government’s instruction to adhere to a uniform academic calendar.