The Bar Council of India on Monday imposed a moratorium on opening new law colleges for a period of three years. The restriction, however, will not apply to National Law University, if proposed by a government in a State where there is no such varsity.
Besides, the BCI can open any model institution of Legal Education, like the National Law School of India University it opened in Bengaluru, a statement signed by its chairperson Manan Kumar Mishra said.
The Council requested State governments and universities to stop unfair means and ensure that vacancies of law teachers in all the college are filled within four months. “At present, there are enough Institutions in all parts of the country to feed the law courts and to serve the people. There is no dearth of advocates and the existing institutions are sufficient to produce the required number of law graduates annually,” the statement said.
Mushrooming of law colleges without proper infrastructure was raised by BCI member from Delhi, Bed Parakash Sharma. The issue was raised in Parliament too. The Council resolved that it would consider pending proposals only. No fresh application would be entertained for any new institution.
The Council said there were about 1,500 law colleges. Among the problems that plague these institutions are lack of infrastructure and chronic teaching vacancies.
