A total of four Bangalore-based law schools had made it into the league table, which included three new entrants but no changes in the top eight schools (see table below).
NALSAR won the first place in the rankings last year for the first time, displacing NLSIU Bangalore.
The top-ranked schools after NLSIU and NALSAR are Delhi University’s Faculty of Law and National Law Institute University in Bhopal, which both retained their places from last year.
Delhi and Pune also scored highly, with three institutions from each of the cities making an appearance in the rankings. Two law schools from each city are also represented in the top 10.
Kolkata’s WB National University of Juridicial Sciences and Mumbai’s Government Law College both dropped by three places this year, to eighth and tenth places respectively.
The league table was compiled by weekly news magazine India Today but the publication did not publish and specify the methodology that was used to rank the law schools. [Ed: see comment #128 below for details of India Today’s methodology in the rankings]
Legally India recently reported that NLSIU was looking to expand significantly under the guidance of a new prominent advisory board.
For Outlook India magazine’s 2009 law school rankings, click here.
Rankings
| 2009 position (2008) | City | Law School |
|---|---|---|
| 1 (2) | Bangalore | National Law School of India University |
| 2 (1) | Hyderabad | National Academy of Legal Studies & Research University |
| 3 (3) | Delhi | Faculty of Law, Delhi University |
| 4 (4) | Bhopal | National Law Institute University |
| 5 (6) | Pune | ILS Law College |
| 6 (8) | Pune | Symbiosis Society’s Law College |
| 7 (8) | Jodhpur | National Law Institute University |
| 8 (5) | Kolkata | The WB National University of Juridicial Sciences |
| 9 (13) | Delhi | Amity Law School |
| 10 (7) | Mumbai | Government Law College |
| 11 (10) | Varanasi | Faculty of Law, Banaras Hindu University |
| 12 (11) | Aligarh | Faculty of Law, Aligarh Muslim University |
| 13 (18) | Kolkata | Faculty of Law, University of Kolkata |
| 14 (-) | Kochi | School of Legal Studies Cochin University of Science & Technology |
| 15 (12) | Bangalore | University College of Law, Bangalore University |
| 16 (21) | Delhi | Faculty of Law, Jamia Milia Islamia |
| 17 (16) | Chandigarh | Department of Law, Punjab University |
| 18 (20) | Kochi | National University of Advanced Legal Studies |
| 19 (15) | Pune | Des Law College |
| 20 (19) | Hyderabad | Faculty of Law, Osmania University |
| 21 (23) | Mohali | Army Institute of Law |
| 22 (25) | Bangalore | Bangalore Institute of Legal Studies |
| 23 (-) | Bangalore | MS Ramaiah College of Law - New |
| 24 (17) | Chennai | Tamil Nadu Dr Ambedkar Law University |
| 25 (-) | Ahmedabad | Faculty of Law Gujarat University - New |
Comments
Pffff. Here we go again. Yes the National Law Schools do matter. Yes, they are the best of the lot but that doesn't mean that they will always end up being ranked one after the other. And please do not start the ugly name calling of law schools here. From what I have heard, some law schools mentioned by you made it to the international rounds of prestigious moot court competitions wile the ones you heralded as being without any equals did not. While that shouldn't matter, but seeing that you are up to your ears with this ranking obssession, you should probably know that as well.
Rankings are essentially a list. And you would never see any two people agree on the contents of a list. The thing with lists is that they organise the collective knowledge and structure them. The way they are ranked is always up for debate.
No one can argue that these rankings are perfect, but they do form a reasonable guide to public perception of these institutions, and their relative standings. Trashing the results wholesale is a pretty cynical point of view, just as taking them to heart would be incredibly naive.
As you so eloquently put it, peace!
The comments here have been intelligent so far. Please keep it that way.
If you really are what your name suggests then it's no surprise to see your law school being ranked at the number it has been assigned in the rankings.
As a couple of people have pointed out wisely on this thread, rankings do not matter. They just give a brief overview of the law schools out there. Please don't get riled up over what India Today writes.
if you're so excited by the sight of seeing your law school at the top of random lists, then perhaps you can pleasure yourself to the NUJS ranking in Outlook magazine. That oughta work.
And maybe, just maybe, you might be happy! You take care of yourself now...k?
Intelligent.
Indeed.
"If you really are what your name suggests then it's no surprise to see your law school being ranked at the number it has been assigned in the rankings."
Very intelligent.
"if you're so excited by the sight of seeing your law school at the top of random lists, then perhaps you can pleasure yourself to the NUJS ranking in Outlook magazine. That oughta work."
Supremely intelligent (and eloquent to boot).
*bows obsequiously*
Down the line - the only competition will be between NLS, NALSAR, NUJS NLU and perhaps NLIU. The rest of the law colleges and national law schools should be catagorized under "average," "below average" "abysmal" and "how on earth is this place a law college!!" and should be ranked separately. As a lawyer who has closely interacted with most of the law schools, one can see through how hollow the methodology must have been. However, what about those who rely on these rankings to make a career choice. God protect those who rely on these rankings and land up joining places like Osmania, DES and Ambedkar.
"With Malice Towards All"
Rent some space in your cranium to your brainy colleagues while it's on vacation.
Later hater :-) !
The India Today rankings were compiled by creating a list of institutions and narrowing those down by surveying "principals, heads of departments and deans" in 12 cities.
Those experts were then asked to distribute 100 points across the parameters: reputation, quality of academic inputs, student care, infrastructure and job prospects.
Experts were not allowed to rank their own colleges and were restricted to ranking only the colleges in their "zones" (east, west, north and south).
Academic experts were then also asked to evaluate the colleges on a national level.
As a final step, the top law schools were asked to supply "factual information", which was "aggregated" and accounted for 30 per cent of the school's final ranking.
The input parameter is different for most institutes-the test as is the input itself (3 year course or 5 year course). The other variation is the length of time an institution has been in existence. Nalsar, NUJS, NLSIU etc. are very recent creations in the Indian judicial history.
The third variation is the alumni of the institution. Alumnus of DU law faculty have been around since the 1920s as compared to the alums.. of NLSUI, the first of the National institutions dedicated to law.
The whole point of this rant is that rankings are pointless-and are self serving as regards the sale of a magazine issue.
The rankings ideally should differentiate between three/five year courses; should take into account alumnus in industry; strength of faculty; books written in the area and accepted at other institutions; infrastructure etc..
If a survey is this comprehensive, the rating will be much better than if an armchair internet based survey is done.
The more open and comprehensive a survey the lesser will be the gripe against the results.
But all said, every top law firms prefer going to National Law Schools only - NLS, NUJS, NALSAR and NLU Jodhpur. These institutes not only get best Indian law firms but also best international law firms - I suppose recruitment is an important criteria!! No other colleges like ILS, Symbi, CLC Delhi gets them.
Apart from that in terms of infrastructure etc National Law Schools are indeed better placed.
These are not only my view but also the views of people from places like ILS/Symbi who laugh at these rankings. India Today is misugiding the potential talents who want to go to just the best and secure placements in top law firms.
I agree with the post below that the survey should be more open and comprehensive to reflect the accurate state.
FYI, CLC, Symbiosis and ILS have had 100% recruitment unlike NLU Jodhpur where a lot of graduates had to go under the guise of litigation and working in NGOs to prevent any spotlight on the apparent failure to attract recruiters from top Indian law firms, let alone international law firms. ILS has had international magic circle law firms come and recruit people from their campus. You should probably check out of your asylum and mingle with the real world now.
i respect your opinion considering the fact that your work lets you interact with graduates of so many law schools...but saying that only nls, nalsar, nujs and nluj attract good students wont be fair in the present scenario...with the establishment of national law schools at delhi, luckhnow, gandhinagar and some other states...i can assure you that in years to come (starting from next year)...you are going to see a lot of good lawyers graduating from law schools other than the colleges you mentioned...having cleared the clat this year (and having made it to nujs), i can assure you that i am no better than someone who is going gandhinagar or lucknow or one who has cleared the national law school delhi's exam ...thus we can say that law schools are heading towards the path of iits....and i guess the legal fraternity should work towards promoting the brand of national law schools instead of promoting any particular college.....
I agree that there is little to differentiate between the top 500 or so who write the CLAT exam, although only about 200 or so get admission into the "big three." After 12th, these students have almost the same aptitude as those who get into NLSs at Gandhinagar, Lucknow or Delhi. The difference however is the quality of education that one receives over the next five years. Believe me, you will be glad that you chose NUJS over, say HNLU in Raipur or NUALS in Kochi. In the top 5 law schools that I mentioned in my earlier post, even if you join as a "donkey," you emerge as a "horse."
I must clarify that my earlier post was based on the situation that prevails today. It is in the interest of legal education in the country that the gap between law schools be narrowed. On the positive side, that is happening slowly but surely. To be fair, I must admit that I have come across some outstanding talent which has emerged from the non national law schools and some really pathetic lawyers from NLS, NALSAR and NUJS.
Many may not agree with me..but i believe every individual law grads themself define how good a lawyer of any domain and of chosen legal career path, he or she can be....Ofcourse the training, imparting of knowledge and exposure matters a lot that varies from lawschool to lawschool but in the end it depends upon the individual how he/she employs all the imbibed knowledge and exposure in his career.Unfortunately some folks dont get the the same level of training or taught in high standards from some lawschools yet it cant be downplayed that these folks doesnt stand any chance in front of guys coming out from some hotshot lawschools.( nd come on.....da profs nd lecturers teaching in dis schools r passouts from the very colleges which are ranked bottom in the list or doesnt even figure in the list.......that doesnt make them a trash,do they??)
There have been people who sucked in +2 yet cracked in some top lawschools in the country ( u cn count me in too)..yet some laboured to secure high marks and landed up in decent college through merit.......that didnt make da former any better than the latter.
and i totally agree with NLS Bangalore about the recruitment issue...dat even bottom placed colleges are within the radar of top law firms, so they aren't treated as untouchables....some of the people do need wide interactions.
...and to round it off, as Nationalite truly said...all this issues regarding superiority are all farce and the whole legal fraternity should act as one to plummel Indian Judiciary to new heights that was never even thought off a decade back and eradicate the negative image still prevalent among many regarding 'good -for-nothing' and evils of legal career.
NLU j is no. 2
rest are nothing at all !
The best thing would be to not give them any attention. Just ignore these rankings. That would be in my opinion, the best response as a community.
And we know that some of the Nationals will make top 5. Fine. No substance in these rankings- so let's trash them and move on.