‘UK could help Indian lawyers'

<div class="section1"><div class="Normal">MUMBAI: Professor Philip Thomas, noted British expert on human rights and legal education, was recently in the city to launch a programme to upgrade the teaching techniques and research and writing skills of Indian law teachers. <br /><br />As director of overseas recruitment at the Cardiff Law School, he set up the programme in conjunction with the Welsh Development Agency and the British Council, which takes eight teachers selected from elite national law schools of India for a month’s intensive training, beginning October.<br /><br />He spoke to Times News Network about the need for a competitive legal education in the globalised economy. Excerpts:<br /><br /><span style="" font-weight:="" bold="">India has a distinguished tradition of foreign-returned legal eagles going back to Mahatma Gandhi and Motilal Nehru and his son, Jawaharlal, not to forget Dr B. R. Ambedkar. After independence, however, things have changed. The legal systems in the two countries have been diverging increasingly. Can you comment?</span><br /><br />You have to recognise that legal education in India is different from that in Britain and our teaching styles are also different. Our teaching is much interactive and tends to be much more challenging for the student. Its also true that law has been historically boundaried by statehood. Indian law is different from that of Pakistan or Bangladesh, although they are all rooted in the common law.<br /><br />However, as a consequence of globalisation, common law has become the principle medium through which any economic activity progresses today via the English language. Lawyers throughout the world,whether from China or Poland, want to know more about the common law and they want to be able to operate effectively in English. Also, as a result of liberalisation of the economy, foreign investors, state enterprises and joint ventures in India since 1992 have tended to take up their legal advice or support from London, New York or Chicago, rather than from within the country. This is because Indian practice is not geared up for this global practice. What India has concentrated on in its legal education is advocacy skills and most lawyers in India tend to be sole practitioners or members of small chambers. <br /><br />The largest firm in India would have about 150 fee-earners. By contrast, a single firm, say, Clifford Chance in London, has 1,500 fee-earners. They have whole teams of people specialising in specific areas such as aircraft-leasing or what have you. So, what you have here is a legal profession that is not necessarily fully trained to operate in the global environment.<br /><br /><span style="" font-weight:="" bold="">So what is your solution?</span><br /><br />We felt it would be much better to bring a law teacher to Cardiff and to send him or her back to India with upgraded skills, so that he or she can use these skills for the benefit of all the students, specially those who would never have the opportunity of going overseas. As for candidates, we are looking at the national law schools in Bangalore,Hyderabad,Kolkata,Bhopal, and Jaipur, and then Delhi and probably Madras Law College and then either Pune or Mumbai.<br /><br /><span style="" font-weight:="" bold="">Aren’t you creating competition for your own country?</span><br /><br />I think India is big enough (to absorb the outflow of legal talent).Moreover, competion is healthy. This is going be an annual event.And I’ve also set it up for China. We are going to have the same number of teachers coming to Cardiff from China.However, the programme will be run differently.</div> </div>