BY THE CO-AUTHORS.
Young Lawyer
Once a London daily carried this advertisement: “Applications invited for an expedition team to the Antartics, low remuneration, sleepless hours, survival rate low, fame guaranteed if successful”.
Aspirants to the legal field can hope for similar working conditions, except that the fame is not guaranteed!! Humour and hyperbole apart the legal profession undoubtedly has its attractions which lie in its challenges and definitely not much in the returns.
It seems like a part of folklore when in the pre-independence era law was the portal of name, fame and lucre, and the presence of charismatic personas like Pt. Motilal Nehru and Chitranjan Das had made it one of the most sought after professions, but today the legal profession stands in need of some serious revamping of its brand equity. When today’s youth opts for a career in law, then most often than not it is one of the last options on his list, and we certainly need to ask why?
As Prashant, a debutante, says with apparent dejection that he opted for law, as that was the only easy option available to him after having exhausted his attempts at other more sought after professions like MBA and the Civil Services. The very first challenge that a young lawyer has to contend with is this low public image, which law is branded with. Law seriously lacks the glamour usually associated with the glitzy professions like medicine, engineering, and business management. One of the reasons for this image could be the poor competitive and educational standards available in most of the law colleges today. With the exception of probably the National Law School at Bangalore or Law Faculty at Delhi University, none of the entrances enjoy the same trust and prestige as an IIT entrance or CAT and are usually considered merely a formality. The same informal approach is perpetuated in the entire mechanism of imparting legal education, which lacks dynamism and stress on practical training. As a result the young lawyers churned out are ill equipped with the requisite confidence and verve to make the profession alive. Moreover most of the law colleges fail to provide an effective interface between the aspirants and the future employers. Monica Luthra, a budding lawyer and an alumni of the Campus Law Center, laments that the institution despite being one of the top ten colleges of the country still doesn’t have a viable placement cell.
So when a young lawyer takes a plunge into the profession most often his on-job experience is his first practical encounter with the legal profession, and this naivette leaves him with a limited bargaining power. Hence usually in the initial years the remuneration is very paltry, which fails to justify the hard, tedious hours the profession demands. This sometimes leads to disenchantment. Sarita Singh took up law on persuasion of friends and she admits that the drama of law held a secret appeal for her, but now coupled with back-breaking hours have robbed the career of the reasonable success and security in the legal profession.
Even a reasonable success and security in the legal profession is preceded by a long gestation period which is one of the greatest single handicap of this field. And even the long wait doesn’t necessarily guarantee success. Unlike most other vocations, in law, growth doesn’t happen in a time-bound frame, success is erratic and uncertain. There is a dearth of realistic role models, and this could be really confusing for any fresher.
It’s not that we don’t have lawyers who enjoy public recognition but in most cases it’s for their exploits in fields other than law which brings them into limelight, politics being one. The success pyramid in the legal profession is more top heavy; we either have very powerful names who monopolize the top order or the swarming mass of strugglers, but a middle rung of relatively successful lawyers who could be easily recognized has failed to win recognition.
Parallels could be drawn between family business and legal practice. Anand Jha, still in his third year at the National Law School, Bangalore, very candidly admits that in law as in business a family background in law pays dividends and success then is a mere carry forward, hence most of the young guns in the profession are the progeny of already successful lawyers or judges.
However, he believes that post-economic-liberalization opportunities in law have expanded many-fold beyond what was traditionally believed, and for a young lawyer who has the requisite skills and talent it is possible to live by the standards of the urban middle class, even if due diligence is required.
But Anand’s views are scoffed by Lalit Sharma, who’s been in practise for three years now, who says that today success in the legal field depends more on hype than merit.
For the young generation the legal profession if not a cakewalk is no cliffhanger either. Sometimes the means themselves become the end, and in law the very struggle involved in the profession can be treated as its reward and as its distinguishing mark. It’s one profession which requires passion and resilience for survival and at the end of the day it’s this very charge and dynamism which holds the ultimate fruit.
The Co-Authors are Students in IVth year B. A. L. L. B. (Hons.) National Law Institute University, Bhopal.