Want to be a lawyer? Now,pass test

“The All-India Bar Council Examination will serve as a benchmark test to ensure a basic level of skill and knowledge among those joining the legal profession,” Solicitor General and Bar Council of India chairman Gopal Subramanium said.

The test will be held every six months and any person failing in it can reappear,he told reporters during the launch of Council’s Vision Statement.

“There is no bar on taking the test,” he said.

The test will have no grading system. A candidate will either pass or fail in the test.

A legal consultancy firm,Rainmaker,will assist the BCI — which regulates legal education in the country – in conducting and managing the test.

The test will apply to law graduates of the session 2009-10 and will be held in nine languages for which applications will be available from July 15 to September 30.

India has 1.1 million enrolled advocates and 1,000 law schools which churn out 60,000 law graduates annually.

The candidates will have to shell out Rs 1300 for the test,Subramanium said.

An expert committee,including former ISRO chief M G K Menon and retired Supreme Court judges,will set the paper.

Candidate will be free to take their notes and text books for the examination.

Asked whether the BCI has taken approval from the HRD Ministry to conduct the test,Subramanuim said as a statutory body,the Council was not dependent on approval by the ministry.

Speaking on the occasion,Law Minister M Veerappa Moily referred to the contentious issue of entry of foreign law firms in the country.

He said “while Indian lawyers claim they are afraid of foreign lawyers,legal reforms could ensure that the world is afraid of Indian lawyers.”

Moily said people only talk of a few known lawyers while his ministry believed in creating several such lawyers who are world famous.