Report On The National Law Aptitude Test (NLAT)
The National Law School of India University (NLSIU) issued an official statement in which the university announced that it has dissociated itself from the CLAT Consortium and it will conducting the National Law Aptitude Test (NLAT) on 12th September 2020 for the admissions of the year 2020 and it won’t be accepting the CLAT examination results for the admissions. CLAT Consortium represented by Prof. Faizan Mustafa and the NLSIU admissions. This announcement by NLSIU made the students across the country furious stating that they have to give another separate exam in this pandemic at such short notice. Several PILs were filed in various High Courts of the country and in the Supreme Court. One Such PIL was also filed by the former vice-chancellor of NLSIU before the Supreme Court claiming that the NLAT would create ‘islands of exclusion’. The Supreme Court passed an order and allowed the test to be conducted, with the caveat that admissions could take place only after a final judgement of the court. The decisions made by current Vice-Chancellor of NLSIU have been criticised cross the country for various reasons.
As decided by the Hon’ble Supreme Court, the National Law Aptitude Test (NLAT) was held on 12th September 2020. The students criticised the mismanagement in conducting the exam by NLSIU. Many students reported technical glitches during the exam and login failures in the country-wide law exam. The site was disrupted with technical difficulties due to which several filed to appear in the examination, as students made more than an estimated 200 calls and messages to the authorities seeking help. However, as per the official website of NLAT, over 93 percent of students appeared in the exam. There were also reports of major unlawful methods in the writing of the exam which questioned the transparency of the National Law Aptitude Test (NLAT).
Facing such huge criticism, NLSIU decided to conduct a re-test on 14th September 2020 for the students who faced technical issues during the test on 12th September. The controversy on the National Law Aptitude Test (NLAT) reached new heights when it was alleged that the question paper of the retest was leaked before the exam finished. There were several reports on internet media which stated that the copy of the question paper had leaked while the test was still going on. The copy has been verified by the appearing students as the one that they had been provided in the NLAT 2020 Re-test paper leak. The exam had taken place from 12:30 pm to 1:15 pm. Reportedly, the paper was doing the rounds on the internet while the exam was still underway.
Many petitioners approached the Hon’ble Supreme Court stating the malpractice in the conduct of the examination. The Bench of Justices Ashok Bhushan, R Subhash Reddy and MR Shah had reserved judgment in the matter on September 17 after giving the case an extensive hearing. The Supreme Court gave its judgement on NLAT on 21st September 2020 and it quashed the NLSIU’s notification the National Law Aptitude Test-2020 held on September 12, for admission to its five-year integrated BA LLB (Hons) programme. While cancelling the NLAT 2020, the court ordered NLSIU to accept the CLAT examinations results for the admission purpose of the UG Programme.
By
Shresth Vidyarthi
Student Reporter, INBA