160 law students won’t be promoted

Source:- timesofindia.indiatimes.com

NEW DELHI: At least 160 students of Delhi University’s Law Faculty, detained for not meeting adequate attendance, will “not be promoted to the next term”, a notice released by the faculty mentions.

Dean of the faculty, Ved Kumari, said that this is due to the attendance norm set by the Bar Council of India (BCI). Many students now claim that they will go to court against this decision.

On May 19, many first-year Law Faculty students who arrived at the Campus Law Centre (CLC) for their Crime II exam were not allowed to appear for it. They were denied permission saying that BCI guidelines “require that students should have at least 70% attendance to sit for the exams,” the dean said.

This led to a protest at the venue that day where students allegedly shut down classrooms and got into a verbal altercation with the dean.

Kumari had alleged that “some of them threatened to commit suicide if they were not permitted to sit for the exam.” Witnessing the violence at the venue, the police was called in.

The exam was eventually postponed but a disciplinary inquiry was called over the whole incident, the report of which was accessed by TOI.

Around 70 students were identified after the May 19 incident and were served a show-cause notice for participating in the protest.

In the Law Faculty’s notice, it is mentioned that for all students missing out on the attendance criterion, “their status as detained students has been restored irrespective of whether they participated in the violent agitation or not. And none of the students whose names appear in the detainee list will be admitted in the next term.”

Students claim that they will go to court against the decision. Responding to this, Kumari said, “Students can go to court if they think they have been treated unfairly.”

However, no action has been taken against the students involved in the violence, and they were let off with a warning.