There has been a revival of sorts of legal education in India from 1990s onwards. The successive establishment of national law schools professionalised legal education in many ways. In this process, the quality of legal education improved. 

As a profession then, law also gradually became a preferred career choice amongst competent students. However, several decades down, today we have the benefit of hindsight to reflect on the outcomes and relevance of these changes in the realm of Indian legal education. 

This is particularly important because the socio-political landscape of the country has also substantially changed. Simultaneous to this, the perception of the constitution and the courts amongst the citizens, and their consequent ideas of the role of law in the society has evolved too. 

How then must we think of legal education today, in light of these developments? 

To explore this question, we will bring together lawyers and academics to discuss avenues of strengthening legal education, and prioritising real-time, on-ground realities to apply to legal training and education. 

Who should attend?

We invite all law students, graduates, and practitioners who are interested in legal education to address contemporary issues in India. Graduating law students will find it interesting if they are also looking for avenues for further studies related to the topic or are curious about pathways for legal education. 

Panellists

We are bringing together lawyers and academics interested and engaged in socially and ethically informed legal education. 

Neeraj Grover is part of the School of Policy and Governance at Azim Premji University, and teaches Law and Development in our LLM programme. His interest focuses on how the social context affects the rules of private law that govern contracts and corporations. His ongoing projects include an enquiry into the changing nature and role of​‘modern’ companies, where he explores their embeddedness in society.

Neeraj studied law at Christ College, Bengaluru and holds an LLM (Master of Laws) with a specialisation in Corporate and Financial Laws from the National University of Singapore. Between 2013 – 15, Neeraj practiced law before the Supreme Court and the Delhi High Court.

Abhayraj Naik is a visiting faculty member at Azim Premji University. He is a co-founder of the Initiative for Climate Action, an active member of the Global Alliance for Justice Education, and an advisor to several progressive social and environmental causes in India and other parts of the world. 

Abhayraj helped initiate the Crafting Justice events that focused on experiential learning and justice in 2017. He is currently building a South Asian Network for Justice Education as well as an alternative learning centre in Bengaluru. Abhayraj holds degrees from the National Law School of India University and the Yale Law School.

Shrimoyee Ghosh is a lawyer and legal anthropologist, whose work focuses on questions of rights and justice, and the law’s relationship to everyday forms of subjectivity and violence. She has worked with local coalitions and organisations on a number of human rights documentation and litigation efforts in Kashmir, Mumbai and New Delhi. 

Her scholarly work has appeared in Journal of Legal Pluralism and Unofficial Law, Contributions to Indian Sociology and other academic journals. She has a BA LLB (2003) from the National Law School of India University, Bengaluru, a Masters in Research (2006) from Birbeck School of Law, London, and a PhD (2017) from the Centre for Study of Law and Governance, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi.

Tejaswini U is an Assistant Professor at St Josephs’s College of Law. She teaches constitutional law, environmental law, administrative law, law of torts, and contracts. Her areas of interest are environmental law, climate change law and policy, animal rights, and constitutional law. She graduated from Azim Premji University [in LLM (Law and Development)] in 2020. She also has a PG Diploma in Animal Protection Laws, NALSAR (2019−2020), and BA LLB (Hons.), the School of Law, Christ University. Tejaswini previously worked at ESG, Bengaluru and Saahas Zero Waste, Bengaluru. 

Economics in higher education should help the learner make sense of complex social realities with strong technical and economic skills. It should help you develop an aptitude for dealing with abstract numbers and statistics with a strong understanding of Indian economy, economic theory, tools of analysis, and the ability to use these in practical scenarios in current economic and development issues.

Our courses in MA Economics gives you the above competencies and also a sense of the plurality of economic schools of thought that are historically grounded. We put real world issues at the forefront of our programme.

The skills of economics are hugely valuable for the public, private and non-profit sector. We hope to train professionals who will bring their abilities with commitment in the development sector.

Join the discussion, interact with our faculty and learn more.

Who should attend?

Students and graduates of Economics who are keen to do a masters in Economics with specialisation in Development and Policy are encouraged to join. This is a programme designed to develop a generation of economists who possess the
necessary theoretical knowledge and technical skills required for high-quality analysis that is embedded in India’s institutional, cultural, and ecological context. The programme is closely aligned with Azim Premji University’s mission to train competent and committed professionals for the development sector.

Speakers

Alex M Thomas, Kade Finnoff, KC Adaina, Tamoghna Halder

To tackle India’s growing public health challenges that address social inequalities in health, we urgently need health practitioners who are committed to the social purpose of public health, have the required competencies and are grounded in the field realities and contexts in the country.

The Indian government as well as the Lancet Commission on education of health professionals for the 21^st century strongly call for revamping public health education to respond to the current and future challenges of public health.

In this webinar, we will discuss how our Master of Public Health (MPH) programme aims to contribute to this by enabling professionals to develop a grounded understanding of public health challenges in India embedded in a commitment to the values of equity, rights, and social justice. It is designed for professionals with medical or non-medical backgrounds, who are interested in tackling India’s growing public health concerns.

Speakers

Arima Mishra, Edward Pinto, Mukta Gundi, Seema Sharma

At Azim Premji University, we envision a world that is equitable, just, humane and sustainable. We view ʻdevelopment’ as a process as much as an outcome. We realise that achieving such an aim requires engagement with the market, state, and community-based institutions to find inclusive pathways and overcome hurdles, especially for those whose voices are not heard.

Our MA in Development programme hence aims to develop future development practitioners, guided by constitutional values of justice, liberty, equality, and fraternity for all citizens. We follow multidisciplinary and transdisciplinary approaches to help students understand different theories of development, analyse important developmental challenges of today, and examine possible strategies to resolve them. 

The programme enables students to develop: 

• Historically and socially grounded understanding of India’s development journey 

• Experiential learning about the lived realities of diverse communities and individuals 

• Ethical sensibilities and practical competencies for development actions 

Who should attend?

We are inviting graduates and working professionals who are keen to contribute towards the social sector to attend our webinar to understand the complexities and challenges in development in India.

About the speaker

Nilotpal Kumar​’s research engages with interactions between political economy and culture with reference to farming in India. He is currently working on horticultural restructuring that is underway in dry parts of South India. His previous research was an engagement with the phenomenon of​‘farmer suicides’ in post-reform India.

He has earlier worked with development organisations in various community settings, and he remains engaged with community-based development practices in rural India.

Ours is a large education system with about 30 crore children ​‚15 lakh schools, 90 lakh (9 million) teachers teaching in those schools. Moreover, 65% of the children in Class 1 – 5 go to a government school.

Public education has a daunting challenge of unparalleled diversity and complexity with 28 States, 8 UTs, 732 districts and over 6,500 blocks. An average of 2,000 schools per district where each district is dramatically different from the other – ecologically, culturally and socio-economically. 

438 living languages, 22 official languages and 29 languages with more than 1 million speakers, scattered tribal populations, habitations in remote areas, girl children, religious and linguistic minorities and the physically challenged present in large numbers and they often have special needs — all add to the diversity. 

Although we see near 100% enrolment in the primary classes we have to work on the following immediate issues: 

• Drop out of children (school completion rate is just 50%, despite the Right to Education Act) 

• Alarming crisis of learning / poor learning outcomes – ASER, NAS proves this 

• Intensify efforts to improve our Public Schools (with the right infrastructure and resources) 

MA Education provides us with a much awaited opportunity to improve the public education system of the country. Moreover, NEP 2020 has created more avenues and opportunities in the ecosystem of Education.

MA Education is designed to address the gap in the education sector and to train students to meet the large demand for professionals with skills for problem-solving and innovation.

Who should attend?

This webinar is for those who are concerned about issues in Education and would like to explore careers in the education sector. We have kept this open for anyone who is engaged and interested in the education space, including those working in NGOs.

About the speaker

Sindhu Mathai is a part of the school of Education at Azim Premji University and engages with the course of Curriculum and Pedagogy in Science. She has a background in science education and has completed a PhD from Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education, Mumbai, on visuospatial reasoning among middle school children. 

She recently concluded a collaborative research project on graphical literacy and associated pedagogic practices across school curricular stages. Over ten years at the University, she was able to explore the area of Curriculum Studies through teaching as well as myriad experiences in school settings and while mentoring post-graduate students. 

Her research and writing interests are quite eclectic. Her previous research project was in the area of informal science learning. This study attempted to characterise​‘hybrid spaces’ that children create and develop while learning science, merging their socio-cultural and science worlds within and outside school.