National Law Institute University Bhopal (NLIU Bhopal) is a

public In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociology, sociological concept of the ''Öf ...

law school A law school (also known as a law centre/center, college of law, or faculty of law) is an institution, professional school, or department of a college or university specializing in legal education, usually involved as part of a process for b ...

and a

National Law University National Law Universities (NLU) are law schools, public law schools in India, founded pursuant to the second-generation reforms for legal education sought to be implemented by the Bar Council of India. The first NLU was the National Law School ...

located in

Bhopal Bhopal (; ISO 15919, ISO: Bhōpāl, ) is the capital (political), capital city of the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh and the administrative headquarters of both Bhopal district and Bhopal division. It is known as the ''City of Lakes,'' due to ...

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

. Established in 1997 by the State of

Madhya Pradesh Madhya Pradesh (; ; ) is a state in central India. Its capital is Bhopal and the largest city is Indore, Indore. Other major cities includes Gwalior, Jabalpur, and Sagar, Madhya Pradesh, Sagar. Madhya Pradesh is the List of states and union te ...

, it is the second law school established under the National Law School system. The university launched its first academic program in 1998, with Indian jurist V.S. Rekhi as the Director. The university admits around 120 candidates each year through the

Common Law Admission Test The Common Law Admission Test (CLAT) is a centralized national-level entrance test for admissions to the 25 out of 27 National Law Universities (NLU) except NLU Delhi and NLU Meghalaya. CLAT was first introduced in 2008 as a centralized entran ...

for the B.A. LL.B. course and around 60 candidates for the B.Sc. LL.B. course. The postgraduate courses offered at the university are the Masters of Law (LL.M.) degree and the Master of Cyber Law & Information Security (MCLIS) degree. The university is a member of the

Association of Indian Universities Association of Indian Universities (AIU) is an organisation and association of universities in India including central, state, institutes of National Importance and Deemed Universities. It is based in Delhi. It evaluates the courses, syllabi, s ...

, and the visitor of the university is the

Chief Justice of India The chief justice of India (CJI) is the chief judge of the Supreme Court of India and the highest-ranking officer of the Indian judiciary. The Constitution of India grants power to the President of India to appoint, as recommended by the outg ...

. It works with the High Court of Madhya Pradesh and the National Judicial Academy. Since 2009, NLIU has stationed the

Rajiv Gandhi National Cyber Law Center Rajiv Gandhi National Cyber Law Centre, Bhopal was established in 2006 by the Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India,New Delhi. The institution is first to deal with new and critical issues relating to various techno-legal ...

, established by the Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India.

History

J.S. Verma had proposed the first National Law School at Bhopal. However, major action would not be taken on this proposition until the National Law Institute University was set up in Bhopal by ''Act No. 41 of 1997'' (or NLIU Act, 1997, which was later substituted by Act No. 06 of 2018). Its first program was launched in 1998, and courses commenced on 1 September 1998. The Masters of Law (LL.M.) program was launched in 2007, producing its first graduates in 2009. The establishment of Student Bodies, Academic Cells and associations started in 2002 with the establishment of the NLIU Moot Court Association. The Centre for Business and Commercial Law and the Rajiv Gandhi National Cyber Law Centre were established in 2008. The university published the first edition of ''Indian Law Review ''in November 2009. The ''NLIU Law Review'' was first published in 2010, and the ''NLIU Journal of Intellectual Property Law'' was first published in 2012. In November 2017, nearly 400 students participated in a week-long

protest A protest (also called a demonstration, remonstration, or remonstrance) is a public act of objection, disapproval or dissent against political advantage. Protests can be thought of as acts of cooperation in which numerous people cooperate ...

outside the university gate, accusing Singh, the Director of the university, of favouritism. Following the protests, Singh, who had been holding the position for the past 10 years, resigned. The

of the time,

Hemant Gupta Hemant Gupta (born 17 October 1957) is a former judge of Supreme Court of India. He is also a former chief justice of the Madhya Pradesh High Court and judge of the Patna High Court and Punjab and Haryana High Court. He retired on 16 October 20 ...

, intervened to resolve the crisis. The

Madhya Pradesh High Court The Madhya Pradesh High Court is the High Court of the state of Madhya Pradesh which is located in Jabalpur. It was established as the Nagpur High Court on 2 January 1936 by Letters Patent dated 2 January 1936, issued under Section 108 the '' ...

began the process of appointing a new director of the university. At the same time, a committee was established to examine administrative mismanagement. With this, the protests ended and classes resumed. In October 2023, NLIU Bhopal hosted an event by the Young Thinkers' Forum, inaugurated by

minister of environment, forest and climate change The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) is an Indian government ministry. The ministry portfolio is currently held by Bhupender Yadav, Union Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change. The ministry is responsi ...

Bhupender Yadav Bhupender Yadav (born 30 June 1969; ) is an Indian politician who is serving as 20th Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change since 2024. He is also a Member of Parliament, Lok Sabha ...

. The event featured speeches and literature deemed

Islamophobic Islamophobia is the irrational fear of, hostility towards, or hatred against the religion of Islam or Muslims in general. Islamophobia is primarily a form of religious or cultural bigotry; and people who harbour such sentiments often stereot ...

and hostile towards Christians, along with posters deriding and villainizing academics and intellectuals, who had previously opposed or criticized the

Bharatiya Janata Party The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP; , ) is a political party in India and one of the two major List of political parties in India, Indian political parties alongside the Indian National Congress. BJP emerged out from Syama Prasad Mukherjee's ...

(BJP). Many students protested, citing

discrimination Discrimination is the process of making unfair or prejudicial distinctions between people based on the groups, classes, or other categories to which they belong or are perceived to belong, such as race, gender, age, class, religion, or sex ...

against

minorities The term "minority group" has different meanings, depending on the context. According to common usage, it can be defined simply as a group in society with the least number of individuals, or less than half of a population. Usually a minority g ...

trans people Trans people may refer to: *Transgender people, people whose gender identity differs from their sex assigned at birth *Transsexual A transsexual person is someone who experiences a gender identity that is inconsistent with their assigned ...

, and

feminists Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideology, ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social gender equality, equality of the sexes. Feminism holds the position that modern soci ...

. Vice-chancellor S.Surya Prakash stated that NLIU did not endorse the ideas presented and did not anticipate the nature of the event. Despite protests, the university allowed the event to proceed.

Academics

Rankings

In 2023, it was ranked 18th on the list of law universities by India's Board of Education National Institute Ranking Framework (NIRF). NLIU was also ranked third among law colleges in

by ''

India Today ''India Today'' is a weekly Indian English-language news magazine published by Living Media, Living Media India Limited. It is the most widely circulated magazine in India, with a readership of close to 8 million. In 2014, ''India Today'' laun ...

'' in 2021 and 2022.

Gallery

File:NLIUEntrance5.JPG, Main gate File:NLIU_campus.jpg, Campus File:NLIUGyanmandir3.JPG, Gyan Mandir File:NLIULibrary10.JPG, Library File:NLIUHostel2.JPG, Hostels File:NLIUGuesthouse1.JPG, Guest house File:NLIUGym2.JPG, Gym File:NLIUSports1.jpg, Fields and Courts

References

External links