The Karnataka High Court has been moved by the Bar Council of India (BCI) seeking to declare that the National Law School of India ( NLSIU Amendment) Act, 2020 as ultra vires to the Constitution of India as it permits 25 percent horizontal domicile reservation for students of Karnataka.
- The Karnataka High Court has been moved by the Bar Council of India (BCI) seeking to declare that the National Law School of India ( NLSIU Amendment) Act, 2020 as ultra vires to the Constitution of India as it permits 25 percent horizontal domicile reservation for students of Karnataka.
- BCI’s contention against Amendment 2020
- Coming of the NLSIU Amendment 2020
- Insertion of Proviso in Section 4 of the NLSIU Act
- Prayer in NLSIU Amendment for Changing the Seat Matrix
BCI’s contention against Amendment 2020
The petition claims that the State without prior consultation of the BCI has enacted the amendment to the Act, providing for horizontal domicile reservation across General, Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribes categories. The National Law School of India University (NLSIU) has provided horizontally 25 percent reservation for students of Karnataka and 5 percent concession on the general merit cut off score on the same lines issuing a revised notification on seat matrix.
The state amendment has nullified the judgment in the case of Lokasha vs Convener, Common Law Admission Test (CLAT-2009) given by the Karnataka High Court.
It was expressed by the petitioner that the State of Karnataka has not provided domicile reservations in its own State Law University, thus subjecting NLSIU to such hostile discrimination and that the amended Act is a serious interference and infringement into the statutory functioning of the petitioner (BCI).
The petition contends that NLSIU has produced 20 Rhodes scholars; out of those seven are from Karnataka from the year 1996 to 2017. The true national character of the institution is manifest in practice and its governance structure and not just in its statutory declared objectives.
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Coming of the NLSIU Amendment 2020
The Karnataka State Assembly passed the National Law School of India (Amendment) Act, 2020 in March which received the Karnataka Governor’s assent on May 4. NLSIU should reserve horizontally twenty-five percent of seats for ‘students of Karnataka’ as per this amendment.
Insertion of Proviso in Section 4 of the NLSIU Act
In Section 4 of the National Law School of India Act, the amendment inserts the following proviso:- “Notwithstanding anything contained in this Act and the regulations made thereunder, the school shall reserve horizontally twenty-five percent of seats for students of Karnataka.”
“Student of Karnataka” means a student who has studied in any one of the recognized educational institutions in the State for a period of not less than ten years proceeding to the qualifying examination.”
The explanation of the section
Prayer in NLSIU Amendment for Changing the Seat Matrix
Prayer for keeping aside the notification dated August 4 issued by NLSIU issuing revised seat matrix for BA LLB (Hons) and LLM Programmes has been put forth.
On August 13, a bench heading by Justice Krishna Dixit will hear two other petitions filed by individuals raising the same challenge.
