The NUJS Kolkata recruitment committee has almost doubled finalists’ job offers this year with a new policy, having placed 84 per cent of students and enticing a Bollywood studio to recruit from campus.

Out of a batch of 93, a total of 83 final year students participated in the recruitment committee of whom 70 have now accepted job offers. The committee coordinator said it was confident hoping for another seven offers in the coming weeks, leaving only three without placements.

Last year only around 40 students were placed by the committee during term time, although the batch was also much smaller at around 75 students and it is understood that students found jobs after graduation as economic confidence of recruiters improved. [Correction: the originally stated figure of 20 students last year was incorrect, as it did not take into account recruitment right until the recruitment year end in June 2009. We regret the error.]

NUJS recruitment committee coordinator Shaswata Dutta said: “We are not expecting 100 per cent recruitment this year but compared to what we had last year it has been quite a fine run.”

The committee this year introduced a “no hold on policy”, said Dutta, which meant that students who were offered a job by any employer would have to withdraw from the recruitment process.

“It has worked for us this year,” he noted, adding that employers had reacted positively to the change although it would depend on the support of next year’s batch on whether the policy would continue.

He said that the biggest recruiter was Amarchand Mangaldas, which had recruited nine and three NUJS students in Mumbai and Delhi respectively (see table for full breakdown).

Sample of 2009-10 NUJS recruiters

Seven students accepted offers from Trilegal, while Luthra & Luthra hired three in Mumbai and two in Delhi. Two students each will join J Sagar Associates (JSA), which visisted NUJS campus for the first time, and Phoenix Legal.

International firms Clifford Chance, Herbert Smith and Norton Rose each offered one training contract to NUJS finalists.

Legal process outsourcing (LPO) company Pangea3 hired two students.

Alongside other in-house legal teams, a Bollywood studio visited the NUJS campus for the first time and made one job offer. [name removed at request of studio]

“[The studio] has never recruited ever from any law school ever,” said Dutta. “We wanted to see how other media houses would need lawyers and that is how we contacted them.”

Kolkata firm R Ginodia & Co hired two students, with one on standby, although Kolkata-founded Khaitan & Co did not visit the NUJS campus this year or make any offers to NUJS interns.

The average salary for placed NUJS students was around 8.5 lakh per year, said Dutta.

Dutta told Legally India that around 10 to 11 students were going to practice in the courts, including students ranked in the top 20. While no non-governmental organisations have yet recruited from NUJS this year, Dutta said that talks were ongoing due to student interest. Several students had also chosen to study LLM degrees abroad.

NLSIU Bangalore had found places for 96 per cent of its students by late January of this year.