NLSIU keeps its date with Rhodes again

Anupama Kumar of the NLSIU has got the Rhodes scholarship.

This year, the prestigious Rhodes scholarship went to five young women. Like every year, this time too a student from the National Law School of India University made the cut, and is all set to travel to the elite Oxford University to pursue higher studies.

Anupama Kumar, a final year law student at the NLSIU, was chosen this year, after a rigorous selection process spanning over six months. Though Anupama, when contacted by The Hindu , excused herself from commenting on this citing “personal reasons”, the brief sent by Rhodes Scholarships in India describes her as a State-level karate competitor, who has been an active participant in international moot courts and debates. It also informs that she intends to read for a Bachelor of Civil Law postgraduate degree at the University of Oxford, adding that she intends to pursue a career in advocacy and litigation.

Since 1996, every year, an NLSIU student has been selected for a Rhodes scholarship, barring one year in 2006. When contacted, Vice-Chancellor R. Venkata Rao called it a “great moment for the college and for Anupama”. He said that the “saga of success” of NLS students with Rhodes has been maintained. “It’s a moment of immense pride and satisfaction. It has been possible due to the absolute commitment and dedication of the faculty,” he said.

Friends thrilled

Anupama’s friends and college mates shared their excitement for her. S. Mathani, her junior, said she was an extremely helpful senior, one who is always “approachable for guidance”. Another friend, who did not wish to be named, said that she serves as a “shining example” to the rest of her peers at the institute and that she was “extremely hardworking and deserving of the scholarship”.

Anupama, along with a team of NLSIU students, had participated in some of the most prestigious moot court competitions in the world including the high-profile and very competitive Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition, an annual international moot competition for law schools held in Washington D.C, United States of America, as well as the Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot, an international moot court competition for law students, held in Vienna, Austria annually.