The Department of Legal Affairs, under the Ministry of Law and Justice, in collaboration with the Bar Council of India (BCI), organized the National Conference on “Strengthening Legal Education through Integration of Regional Languages” at the Bar Council of India, New Delhi.
The conference aimed to formulate a Ten-Year Perspective Action Plan for promoting legal education in Hindi and other Indian languages, while strengthening the justice delivery system through greater linguistic inclusivity.
National Conference on Integration of Regional Languages in Legal Education
Organised By
- Department of Legal Affairs, Ministry of Law and Justice
- Bar Council of India (BCI)
Objective
- Formulate a Ten-Year Perspective Action Plan for promoting legal education in: Hindi and Other Indian languages
- Strengthen the justice delivery system through greater use of regional languages.
- Enhance accessibility, inclusiveness, and quality in legal education.
Key Highlights
Phased Integration of Indian Languages
- Deliberations focused on creating a: Structured, Phased, Measurable and Quality-assured framework
- Framework aims to systematically integrate Indian languages into legal education.
Bilingual and Multilingual Legal Education
- Proposed adoption of a bilingual, gradually multilingual, legal education model.
- At the same time, English will continue to be retained as an important:
- National link language
- International link language
Improving Access to Justice
The proposed framework seeks to:
- Improve legal comprehension among students.
- Enhance access to justice.
- Strengthen: Legal aid services and Clinical legal education
- Better prepare future legal professionals for practice before:
- District Courts
- Subordinate Courts
Role of Technology
- Participants discussed the use of technology to accelerate language integration within the legal ecosystem.
- Emphasized digital tools for multilingual legal education and justice delivery.