Varsity’s law course in distance mode in dock

A division bench comprising Justice MM Sundresh and Justice R Hemalatha, before whom the plea moved by advocate B Ramkumar Adityan came up for hearing on Friday, issued notice to both the State and Centre, and Annamalai University returnable in two weeks.

Seeking to restrain Annamalai University from admitting students in law courses, the plea said the classical ingredients of legal training consisted of qualified faculty, dedicated research centres for students, sound infrastructure and updated legal literature. But none of these was possible through distance education mode.

Ramkumar submitted that the Directorate of Distance Education, Annamalai University, offered LLB (Academic) and LLB (General) in the name of Bachelor of Academic Law. After completing these two courses, students could apply for LLM and thereafter on completing PhD, they could become professors in Law colleges, which was against legal education laws and rules, and natural justice, he added.

He also argued that the law degrees offered through such distance education programmes could not be compared with the LLB or Bachelor of Legislative Law, which is a prerequisite for anyone wanting to enter the field of judiciary and law offered by colleges and universities approved by the Bar Council of India.