Outline of legal practice in India: developing the future of the Indian Legal Profession

Abstract

In contemporary legal India, it is critical to obtain a deeper understanding of the preexisting structure of Legal Practice in India. While exploring post-1991 change, we must also understand the impact of Liberalization, Privatization, and Globalization, particularly Globalization toward law practice in India. Law practice, predominantly litigation, and corporate law firms, has a significant impact on India’s socioeconomic as well as political structure. Besides, such a deeper understanding not only provides the context of the topic, theme, or purpose but also assists in constructing a relatively common factual or analytical base. This analytical and deep understanding shared by many of the prominent legal dignitaries, which can be found common, helps to understand and interpret the law in a better way. In light of this, the growth in the legal profession has been impressive, but the ground realities should not be stayed untouched. This review article has endeavored to modify the typology of the Indian Legal Profession. The base has been relied upon in the US corporate legal market. The reasons were that Western corporate firms and in-house legal departments were the first to develop and are generally acclaimed as being the best in the world. Second, even Indian lawyers who prefer not to adopt the American model often define their approach in opposition to the American model, making the comparison more relevant. Third, given India’s increasing interactions with the global marketplace, Indian law firms, their employees, and their clients are likely to have more direct exposure to US and UK corporate law firms and legal departments. Finally, to the extent that the new corporate legal market in India has developed in part in perceptions about the Anglo-American corporate legal market, changes in the latter market may foretell changes that will affect the Indian legal market in the coming years. This is particularly of interest because some of the realignment of corporate legal services markets in the United States and the United Kingdom are precipitated by globalization—which is one of the key drivers of change in the Indian legal market and its future.

Keywords:

• Law practice
• globalization
• history
• development
• legal education
• litigation
• Indian Legal Profession

REVIEWING EDITOR:

• Geng Yuqing, Shanghai Dianji University, China

SUBJECTS:

• South Asian Studies
• Curriculum Studies
• Educational Research
• Higher Education
• Commercial Law
• Legal Skills, Method and System
• Socio-Legal Studies
• Education and Training
• Legal History

1. Introduction

The current stance of the legal practice in India at the outset is the historical exploration of law, the state, society, and the legal profession in India. This is because the practice of law is often closely identical to developments in these areas, which propel legal practice in India and outline the structure and how it is provided. Certainly, this review article shall show the fortunes of the practice of law, predominantly litigation and corporate legal sector (including business areas), which have ebbed and flowed over time with the developments transpiring in these areas. Nonetheless, several key areas of general legal practice aid in constructing a common reference point, such as pro bono and grand advocates, that eventually help to understand and interpret the law in a better way; however, there could be the complexity and multihued form of arts in each mandating the requirements of enriching understanding.

This review article examines, focuses on, and discusses eight truncated parts in the proceeding. The second part is the review methodology of the manuscript which involves analysis by way of the interview method. The third part is on Pre-Independence India, which examines the early development of the legal profession in India, mainly by Kautilya Arthashastra in the classic age to precisely in the Mughal Empire in the medieval period. In the succeeding one, a profession of pleaders (vakils) emerged who were appointed by a government to represent them in a court of law. The fourth part explores the impact of the advent of the British East India Company as they developed their own courts and law firms that served British clients (whose business interests were enlarging in India). The fifth part describes the developments following India’s Independence (1947–1991). As India gained Independence, it controlled and organized the legal system of the country in the interests of Indians. This included establishing the Bar Council of India (BCI) and the bona fide decision to shift the apex court (Supreme Court of India) from London, England, to Delhi, India with a general view of BCI norms’ application and its scrutinized criticism as the unequal influence and power in developing the legal profession. Further, the sixth part examines the first decade of the New Economic Policy (NEP), 1991–2000 and 2000-present (Wilkins et al., 2017). This era is essential for the development of legal education and the widening of law firms in India. It saw the growth of National Law Schools and economic developments as restrictions on foreign exchange were relaxed. From 2000 to now, India has observed the global interaction of Indian law firms and their developments. These developments increased the demand for lawyers and the need to train law students in National Law Schools. The seventh on the dynamic future of the Indian Legal Profession after the interaction of Indian law firms and their clients, their employee’s direct exposure to the United States and the United Kingdom [often the employees have studied or worked in both countries]. Finally, the eighth is on concluding the review article with my submission of effective suggestions.

2. Review methodology

This review article maps the current state of corporate legal practice in India beginning with a historical exploration of the business, law, the state, and the legal profession in India. This is because corporate legal practice is often closely associated with developments in these areas, which drive the demand for corporate legal work and the structure of how it is provided. Indeed, the method we see is about the fortunes of the corporate legal sector in India that have ebbed and flowed over time as developments occurred in these areas. The literature provides a detailed typology of corporate legal practice in India as well as identifying the key areas of general legal practice; it further aids in constructing common reference points in the rest of the included chapters. Finally, the analysis found that most senior lawyers together stated in one of the interviews by Marc Galanter and Nick Robinson in 2014, that they approved juniors at the request of friends, retired justices, or colleagues (there was no formal selection process). Hence, it is beneficial, if unessential, to be based in this social stratum to elicit the needed referral to a senior. Precisely, these are the early macro privileges in the profession confined to an elite persons’ blood and non-bloods’ preferred relations.

3. Law in pre-independence India [4th BCE and 16th CE]

Till the mid-1700s (Dhavan, 2022) for 300 years, Justice was speedy and conciliated, mostly call: settlement at that time was quick. Although this period viewed disruption on many fronts, there is also substantial evidence that economic growth was robust, and the operation of a judicial system was powerful.

In the Classical or Golden Age of India, where Hindu religious and intelligence resurgence was witnessed in Vishnugupta Chanakya Kautilya’s The Arthashastra, particularly on the administration of justice during the fourth century BCE, it was believed that if there’s no justice, there’s no society or state. He built a comprehensive judicial system containing several elements that offer the twenty-first-century in-depth insights into the disputes relating to crimes and punishment.

The facets of effective law enforcement for justice include the emphasis on judicial fairness, honesty of the law enforcers and impartial, proportional, and certain punishments, and discretion in sentencing them. Kautilya reasoned that sentencing a severe punishment was as ineffective as a low level of punishment in minimizing the crime, explaining that there is a nonlinear relationship between the level of crime and the level of punishment. Moreover, understanding the importance of evidence in separating guilt from innocence suggests that additional evidence reduces the type I errors (false-positive) and type II errors (false-negative) (Stout, 1996). Though he was unaware of this jargon, nonetheless, it was implicit in his analysis.

His conceptualized frameworks on reparations of Type I Error, Kautilya (p. 493) wrote, ‘An innocent man who does not deserve to be penalized shall not be punished, for the sin of inflicting unjust punishment is visited by the king. He shall be freed of the sin only if he offers thirty times the unjust fine (4.13)’. On Type II Error, Kautilya (p. 437) suggested, ‘If a King is unable to apprehend a thief or recover stolen property, the victim of the theft shall be reimbursed from the Treasury (i.e. the king’s resources). Property [unjustly] appropriated shall be recovered and returned to the owner; otherwise, the victim shall be paid its value (3.16)’ (Sihag, 2007).

Thus, his proposed judicial system had built-in fairness and deterrence since there was an incentive not to commit both errors and minimize omission and commission. In fact, at that time imprisonment as a punishment did not exist, it was only for the temporary duration of the trials. There were physical punishments but not for nonserious crimes if the person wished, then it could be substituted with monetary fines.

Therefore, in the early fourth century BCE, administration of justice through his judicial system in the Arthashastra was vastly preferred for monetary punishments over nonmonetary ones, and the excessive punishments because of ‘greed, anger or ignorance’ were counterproductive since people were ignorant for the respect of the law. Furthermore, fairness was essential for political stability, which was expedient for prosperity.

From the early sixteenth century CE, the Mughal Empire (Ehrlich, 2018) ruled over large parts of India that mandated proper judicial functioning and pleadings of the common people. The Mughals also maintained both secular and clerical beliefs. However, in specific matters, those were nonbelievers of Islamic Law (Pirbhai, 2016), for instance, Hindus and Christians had to resolve their disputes under Hindu (N. Chatterjee, 2020) and Christian Law (Bayly, 1985).

Furthermore, in villages, there was a structure called ‘Panchayat as a rule of law (Mendelsohn, 1993) which was based on caste’. Rural or local matters were resolved through socioreligious customs (Mcdermott et al., 2014). There was not much intervention from the Mughals on the application and usage of local customs. Mughals have their decision-making (Akhter, 2013) authority. Those were called qazis, but corruption emerged; that’s another thing. As a disputant, people could have a representative to file their petition or argument and present it (Lhost, 2022). This was done before a local decision-making body, which can be called the court in English, yet as the Persian language was prevalent at that time, it was called Durbar (Din, 2018).

Subsequently, to the language point, Persian was mandatory at that time to become a Vakil (Alam, 1998). After 1826, English replaced Persian as a court language, as a jury bill (Jaffe, 2014) for India was passed by both houses of the parliament (House of Commons and the House of Lords) (Deb, 1826) and presented by Raja Ram Mohan Roy, an Indian Reformer of that time. This bill was the historic and incessant work of Raja Ram Mohan Roy, which Hindus and Mohammedans signed.

Although Vakils in the mid-seventeenth century or the sixteenth century may not always have been trained and skillful, they understood the local issues that were political, judicial, and administrative. Besides, a right to appear and present at a court at that time, particularly what we now call this locus standi, was based on kinships and caste (Natarajan, 2009). Hence, the need and quality of the first-generation lawyer (Wilkins et al., 2017, p. 9) (then Vakil) were also prevalent.

Justice chambers were called Adaalat Khaana, and as written before, they were represented or assisted by Qazi to Mughal emperors. At the time of Jahangir (son of Akbar), William Hawkins said for him that the (Jahangir) Indian Emperor sat every day for Justice. Nicholas Withington observed that Emperor Jahangir sat in his Durbar at Agra (a city in India) three times a day for justice (Banerjee, 2017).

4. Advent and impact of the British on India (1757–1947)

As the Mughal Empire was weakened by the emergence of the British East India Company, they strengthened their economic power through external trade. The impact started with the advent of the British, Portuguese, and French at the beginning of the 17th century. The major impact was from Britishers, whose company reigned from 1757 to 1857 before the sepoy mutiny spark (Sidhu, 2017) given by Mangal Pandey (Ahmad, 2021).

In 1754, As the Royal troops arrived in India, the terms of the Mutiny Act and the Articles of War made them applicable to Companies’ military forces. The result of the Battle of Plassey in 1757 paved the way for the British conquest of Bengal and, eventually, the whole of India. The need for the law authority in the three jurisdictions which were presidencies at that time (The Presidency Small Cause Courts Act, 1882) (Calcutta, Bombay, and Madras).

In 1772, Warren Hastings laid the foundation for two types of judicial administration: 1) Mofussil or District Court. 2) Sadar or Provincial court. The company established its own provincial and appellate courts for resolving the civil as well as criminal courts consisting of the Chief Justice and three judges (later reduced to two) appointed by the Crown (Hooker, 1969) acting as King’s court pleaders: vakils and British Barristers; these were still prevalent in forms of administrative institutions by the Mughal empire and were continued by the British. ‘For Sir Elija Impey (Olanipekun, 2013) was appointed as the first Chief Justice of the court of Calcutta’.

To the litigation at that time, as written before about the development of two first time, the regular legal profession of vakils and other native pleaders was created (Schmitthenner 1968-1969) (Wilkins et al., 2017, p. 40). A large population of vakils and attorneys were involved in trial courts or adjudications [the Bengal Regulations VII of 1793 also regulated legal fees and appointment of government pleaders, among other matters. It addressed licensing and disciplining of the non-barrister legal professional (e.g. vakils)].

Before the 1857 revolt, the Bengal regulations, 1793 and 1833 (Clarke, 1885), The Legal Practitioners Act, 1846 was passed (Sinha, 1968). In former (Bengal regulations) as written above, which evolved in the work of S.W. Schmitthener (Noronha et al., 2016) later in 1968. The Bengal Regulation VII of 1793 was given by Lord Cornwallis (Governor-General of India at that time). It gave the power to create Sadr Diwani Adalat to enroll advocates for the first time (Sinha, 1969). This also ensured the quality of the practicing advocates, which became more respectable. In the Legal Practitioners Act of 1846, the pleading power was given to persons of whatever nationality or religion and were registered by Sadr Courts. Moreover, the 1846 Act permitted barristers and attorneys to be admitted as pleaders in a court of the East India Company.

5. Post-sepoy mutiny truncated discussions

As the East India Company reign ended with the revolt of 1857, the British Parliament passed the Government of India Act, 1858, which brought British India under its jurisdiction (Waghmare, 2018). A new system of courts (Baxi, 1985) was established, and the Company’s court was abolished. Now, there were three kinds of legal practitioners: attorneys, advocates (Government of India, Tenth Law Commission, 1984), and vakils (Indian law degree holders, they were the lowest-ranking legal practitioners).

In the subordinate court, there were pleaders, mukhtars, and revenue agents who even didn’t have a law degree and were allowed to practice. There was also a remarkable change in legal practice. For example, in 1891 (Wilkins et al., 2017, p. 45), there were only seven Indian advocates out of the 24, and in 1911, out of 250 advocates, 234 were Indians in the Bombay High Court (Wilkins et al., 2017, p. 45). Many large new firms were also established, but they were based on nepotism, and many firms were rooted in communities and caste. For instance, Parsis and Marwaris were prevalent at that time. These developments led to the rise of legal education in India (Wilkins et al., 2017, p. 46).

Hence, lawyers were now actively involved in the public domain, and they played a crucial role in India’s Independence movement. For example, Gandhi, Ambedkar, Nehru, Jinnah, and Patel were lawyers involved in this; as lawyers, they took training from the United Kingdom.

At that time, this educational institution was needed in India. The emergence of the National Law School took place in the post-1980s. Spark gave fire to the British after 190 years, and the need, understanding, and way of teaching legal study was cherished. This took time as the lawyer’s legal education was based on examination, not to improve a socially and economically backward society (Baxi, 1989). This abated progress for a long time.

In summarizing these two sub-sections, the history of the legal profession has seen many struggles at a certain point in time, precisely in the Mughal Empire or British India. A struggle is seen in terms of the beginning of the vakils and pleaders, their recognition, and the analytical interpretation of comprehensive English Law, which was applied to conditions in India for the Company’s benefit and also left certain legal provisions and filled the lacuna for India.

6. Is there scope of development in law Post-independence?

After India achieved independence in 1947, there were some key developments (Kachwaha, 1998) in improving the legal and judicial hierarchy in India.

The first development was the government-enacted Advocates Act in 1961 (Veeraraghavan, 1972).

Second, the BCI (Veeraraghavan, 1972, p. 240) has been constituted, a statutory body under section 4 (Veeraraghavan, 1972, p. 241) of the Advocates Act, 1961. At a central level, it was made a primary body responsible for governing, promoting, and providing standards for legal education in India. This abolished the difference between vakils and barristers in India that remained for over 200 years. Henceforth, there would be only one class of advocates who can practice at any court across India. It also recognized various universities whose law degrees were contented with the requirements under the Advocates Act of 1961 to enroll as an advocate.

However, there are some scrutinized criticisms of the Bar. For instance, the upper ranks of the system including lawyers and judges are avid readers of these papers, whose contents become generally known in these circles. Further, other lawyers have used professional associations as part of their rise or as a signal of their influence and power. Many reputed advocates are or were presidents of their respective High Court Bar Associations, the Supreme Court Bar Association, or the Bar Association of India. These processes ultimately help lawyers in acquiring more high-profile clients though it is viewed as a normal discourse either through early privileges or later tactics.

The third was establishing the apex court (Neuborne, 2003) (the Supreme Court of India) in 1950. Before (Rediker, 2013) Independence, the court of appeal was in London, United Kingdom. At this moment in time, it was created in Delhi, India. The Supreme Court structure was in two key attorneys; first, the advocates-on-record (AoR) (Nick Robinson, 2017), which was different from advocates and was inclined toward public service.

Moreover, there is a certain procedure to work as an advocate on record, such as Supreme Court practice experience, 1-year training under a senior advocate, and an exam conducted by the apex court. These developments focused on practicing advocates in Delhi, as the apex court was in Delhi. Compared to AoR, senior advocates (Galanter & Robinson, 2014) are more influential and earn more than AoR.

A few highly top lawyers (Bhan, 2015) in the twenty-first Century, like Harish Salve, Abhishek Manu Singhvi, Prashant Bhushan, etc., not only charge a per-hour hearing fee but also (Galanter & Robinson, 2014, p. 253) appearance fee. Most litigation advocates (Hebbar et al., 2020) do this for ‘substantial earnings’.

6.1. On legal education

In 1958, law universities adopted a 3-year law program, and in 1967, they started following procedural subjects of 3-year law courses in India. Finally, in 1986 a 5-year integrated law program (Ballakrishnen, 2010) was adopted. India’s first national law school, the National Law School of India University (NLSIU), was the first one to offer this course.

However, there was still a lacuna in the average quality (Government of India, Twenty-First Law Commission, 2017a) of attorneys till the mid-1990s. For instance, the estimated number of attorneys increased from 88,000 to 450,000, but due to the delays in work and the court structure, many left this career. Even some brightest and most excellent lawyers took careers besides law, which led to a drop in the average quality of lawyers before 1990.

The growth across so many sectors of the legal profession puts great pressure on legal education in India to meet multiple demands. Immediately, before the liberalization, the BCI began to take a few steps forward reform with the establishment of the first national law school in Bangalore in 1987, which offered a 5-year integrated degree B.A. LL.B. degree to undergraduate students. The development of the national law school was accompanied by reforms in curriculum, pedagogy and teaching methods, accreditation of law schools, law school entrance criteria, and so forth. The motivation underlying these reforms was that Indian legal education needed a considerable overhaul to successfully tackle the challenges unleashed by the forces of globalization (BCI 2010). However, the BCI did not start to train corporate lawyers but rather to train leaders and attorneys in the public interest. The changes over time—as discussed—led to the rising popularity of the 5-year integrated degree model. The next set of national law schools all opened late as it became clear that the demand for lawyers in the corporate sector was soaring. Overall, the national law schools have proved quite successful with their highly competitive selection procedures and market-oriented curriculum, and they have come to be regarded as premier legal institutions, with their graduates actively pursued by law firms and corporate in-house departments.

6.2. Developments post-1991 (NEP)

The impact of Liberalization (Wilkins et al., 2017, p. 46) had a considerable influx of foreign capital into India. This led to new contractual agreements and acquisitions (Wilkins et al., 2017, p. 46) which led to the rise in demand for lawyers for complex deals with mergers and acquisitions. Over time, the government began to remove the industrial licensing system (Wilkins et al., 2017, p. 47) and new sectors were more open for private companies, and other things impacted, like liberalizing FDI norms and trade (Wilkins et al., 2017, p. 47).

One suggestion I can infer from the current license system is that Lawyers should renew their license every year, not every five years, which is mandated by the Bar Council of India (BCI). This will help in improving records and exclude fake or counterfeit lawyers.

In the 1990s, through Globalization (Wilkins et al., 2020) there was free movement of lawyers between the two countries. This enables the free exchange of ideas and practice. ‘Access to foreign legal materials has become much easier due to the development of information and communication technology. Until a few years ago, subscriptions to foreign law reports and law reviews were quite expensive and, hence, beyond the reach of most judges, practitioners, and educational institutions. However, the growth of the internet and globalization has radically changed the picture (Wilkins et al., 2020, p. 35). The decisions of most Constitutional Courts are uploaded on freely accessible websites’. Globalization has also improved the quality of legal education as integrated (Raj Kumar, 2013) with global universities (Wilkins et al., 2020, p. 3).

6.3. Litigation through globalization

As there was a global interaction of lawyers, attorneys, and solicitors, new cases emerged inside India as well as outside India. Liberalization was based on reciprocal relationships. There was the elimination of barriers to entering contracts and involvement in economic activity. Resolution of national and international disputes by sharing law, new knowledge, experience, and strategies. Privatization of government firms leads to the involvement of new entrants and new capabilities (Papa & Wilkins, 2011). This also resolved the already overburdened courts in India. Consequently, increased work in litigation demanded increased fees in the fields of constitutional law, real estate, commercial matters, and tax law.

Besides, other government advocates also benefited those who deal with inheritance, interunion, and state disputes. Indeed, the higher opportunities, new entrants, and integration led to increased demand in litigation and arbitration (Wilkins et al., 2017, p. 52) which improved the quality and expenses of lawyers.

6.4. Legal education pressure and development incumbent

Simultaneously, there was a growing trend of the legal profession (Wilkins et al., 2017, p. 51) in India post-Liberalization, Privatization, and Globalization (Wilkins et al., 2017, p. 53), there was also pressure on legal education in India to help to maintain this trend (Papa & Wilkins, 2011, p. 203). BCI took steps to reform national law schools in India. Followed by the first national law school in India that is NLSIU Bangalore, and the rising population of 5-year integrated law courses to construct the next level of national law schools.

Currently, there are NALSAR Hyderabad, NLU Delhi, WBNUJS Kolkata, NLIU Bhopal, NLU Jodhpur, GNLU Gandhinagar, HNLU Raipur and 20 other national law schools. In this list, NLUs were established in the 1990s and 2000s. The advantage and output of this law school were that it expanded the quality (Mustafa et al., 2018) of the corporate sector (Mustafa et al., 2018, p. 56), litigation (Mustafa et al., 2018, p. 19), and the judiciary (Mustafa et al., 2018, p. 19).

Overall, students are presently admitted into these law schools through national-level competitive exams for 5-year undergraduate law courses such as the Common Law Admission Test (Sharma & Singla, 2018) and All India Law Entrance Test (Ballakrishnen, 2010, p. 154).

Accordingly, this created more competition in law schools to improve the quality of lawyers in both general and specific. This focuses my attention on the general and specific fields in practice. It is further dealt with in conclusions and suggestions. The growth of the legal profession has been impressive, but we should not lose touch with ground realities.

Indeed, there has been development in legal education and profession, 23 national law schools (Indian Law Schools Associated with Pro Bono Club Scheme List as on 1/02/2023, 2023) established according to the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD), India (India Rankings 2022 Law, 2022). Additionally, private law schools like Jindal Global Law School (JGLS) (Pagedar et al., 2022) and Symbiosis Law School (SLS) (Gurpur & Raut Desai, 2014) have entered offering global legal education.

Thus, here arises one question of public or private legal institution choice and economic potential to enter these colleges, even to go through the process to enter it. Although there are specific legal reforms and developments, the ground realities issue persists (Mendelsohn, 1981) till now.

7. The future of the Indian Legal Profession

In India particularly always, the Public and Profession acknowledges envisaging the lawyer in the role of courtroom advocate, preferably a mediator, negotiator, quite less social planner, and business legal advisor. Lawyers see themselves as this course of action, and clientele usually come to them at the pretty late stage of a dispute; thus, lawyers already commit to going to court. Besides, ties with clients tend to be in parts (Galanter, 1968). As in earlier days, the lawyer’s office is under the Government (Sahay, 1931) and not as independent practitioners. It does not serve as a staging area of operations in various arenas. Since a lawyer typically spends his working life at a particular extent of such a system, having its business regularly at a court. However, despite the stratification involved, the profession is comparatively consonant. This is found in most of the cases in dispute resolution methods, particularly informal (mediation, negotiation, conciliation, arbitration, and private judging), both in-person and online, as its existing state of affairs further envisages formal (litigation) in India. There have been several instances where online dispute resolution (ODR) mechanisms have been given a push either by the National Institution for Transforming India (NITI) Aayog GOI, Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) [29 March 2023 board meeting decided to amend on 1 October 2023 the listing obligations and disclosure requirements regulations to operationalize ODR mechanism for investors across registered intermediaries and regulated entities] (Securities and Exchange Board of India (Listing Obligations & Disclosure Requirements) Regulations, 2015, 2015), or the court indicated toward this approach (Meters and Instruments Private Limited & Anr. v. Kanchan Mehta (1 SCC 560, 2018); State of Maharashtra v. Praful Desai) (4 SCC 601, 2003). NITI Aayog, in their released report titled ‘Designing the Future of the Dispute Resolution: The ODR Policy Plan for India’ on 29 Nov 2021 for ODR Policy, has recommended the measures at three levels: the structural level, behavioral level, and regulatory (NITI Aayog, 2021). It also stressed introducing amendments to the statutes for strengthening, and it offers a phased implementation framework for ODR in India (NITI Aayog, 2021, p. 99).

Furthermore, according to the answer to the unstarred question, no. 3908 on 25 March 2022 by the Ministry of Law and Justice (Lok Sabha, 2022) that the concept of ODR is in its nascent stage and reiterated that the NITI Aayog constituted an expert committee in June 2020 under the chairmanship of Justice A.K. Sikri, Retired Judge, Supreme Court of India. Thus, the Government of India has already initiated steps to strengthen ODR mechanisms in the country. I believe it needs greater anticipation and enforcement as it would be the future of the legal profession and precisely accompany a future of justice (Mania, 2015).

8. Conclusion and suggestions

Key Findings, Contributions and Novelties – The Effective Suggestions:

1. Adopting the practice and technological platforms is the requisite of the dynamic science and technology and growth of the day-to-day routine and futuristic approach for overall (S. Chatterjee et al., 2020) development. Evidently, the legal profession has been very slow to take up technological change. Some of the significant creative/unconventional changes can be made, such as online legal guidance, legal open-sourcing, and electronic legal marketplace.

2. The curriculum should be updated according to the needs of the current legal issues that are prevalent in Indian society (Taylor von Mehren, 1965). Such as new laws to opt for, particularly cyber law, which revolves around complex legal issues, from pornography to privacy, including harassment, domain names to Napster (the first illegal music download site) and iTunes.

3. Private and Public institutions in India should be given equal facilities so that precisely from the bottom, the middle and upper sections can study together with no social and economic burden. Such systemic barriers have made legal education a nonserious and nonacademic endeavor with demarcated opportunities in the legal profession. Equal recognition to them is not natural to students’ backgrounds but is based on their credentials during/after law school. This will eventually pave the way to compete high for global recognition in legal education and further in the legal profession.

4. For legal practice in India, as written in developments, the license of a lawyer should be renewed every year by the BCI rather than every 5 years to maintain the quality and authenticity of the legal profession. Furthermore, with serious efforts to ensure lawyers continuing education through such as the establishment of lawyers’ academies at all levels, this ought to be given priority by Governments.

5. In India, there is a need for in-depth and analytical research in every facet (Tribe, 2004) that should be promoted at all levels of legal education and the legal profession. Persistence of such in dispute-handing set some very real limitlessness to direct social change which besets the country along with the Constitution of India and statutory laws such as Civil Procedure Code (referring mediation too), Indian Penal Code, Companies Act, Industrial Disputes Act, etc.

8.1. Limitations

As the law has limitations, particularly this review article in India, as well as depending more on politics (Echeverri-Gent et al., 2021), social (Vinay & Rajyashree, 2011), and economic (Vinay & Rajyashree, 2011) pressures, which turns out to be pessimistic. Social engineering, engineering economics, and political engineering not only in the theoretical method but practical ways at the ground level are prerequisites.

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Additional information

Notes on contributors

Pragyanshu Gautam

Pragyanshu Gautam is a former Judicial Intern at the Office of the Hon’ble Chief Justice of India, Dr. Justice D. Y. Chandrachud.