New Delhi, July 11: Legal experts, academicians and officials on Saturday discussed a 10-year perspective action plan for promoting legal education in Hindi and other Indian languages within the justice delivery system at a conference organised by the Department of Legal Affairs, Ministry of Law & Justice, an official said. Led by Justice Rajendra Menon, Chairperson, Armed Forces Tribunal, and Co-Chairperson, Standing Committee on Legal Education, the Conference on “Strengthening Legal Education through Integration of Regional Languages” reaffirmed the shared commitment to promoting inclusive, accessible, and high-quality legal education by integrating Indian languages in a calibrated manner.
The Conference, organised in collaboration with the Bar Council of India (BCI), aimed to advance the vision of equitable access to justice and contribute towards the realisation of Viksit Bharat @2047, said an official statement. Others who participated in discussions were Manan Kumar Mishra, Member of Parliament (Rajya Sabha) and Chairman, Bar Council of India, and Rajiv Mani, Secretary, Department of Legal Affairs, along with other dignitaries.
The Conference was organised with the objective of formulating a Ten-Year Perspective Action Plan to promote Legal Education in Hindi and other Indian languages, as well as the justice delivery system. The event brought together senior representatives of the Central Government, Vice-Chancellors of leading Centres of Legal Education, members of the Bar, representatives of the Judiciary and eminent legal academicians to deliberate upon a structured roadmap for strengthening multilingual legal education in India, said the statement.
The deliberations focused on developing a phased, structured, measurable and quality-assured framework for integrating Indian languages into legal education while preserving English as an important national and international link language, it said. The proposed framework aims to promote a bilingual and progressively multilingual legal education model to enhance legal comprehension, improve access to justice, strengthen legal aid and clinical legal education, and better prepare future legal professionals for practice before district and subordinate courts, it said.
The participants also deliberated upon the role of technology in accelerating language integration within the legal ecosystem. It was emphasised that emerging technologies, including Artificial Intelligence-enabled translation tools, digital legal repositories, standardised legal glossaries and terminology databases, should be effectively leveraged, subject to rigorous validation by legal and linguistic experts, to facilitate accurate and reliable legal education in Indian languages.
As part of the way forward, the Conference resolved to work towards a National Declaration on Indian Languages in Legal Education, finalise the broad framework of a Ten-Year Perspective Action Plan for phased implementation, and establish a National Steering Committee, jointly anchored by the Department of Legal Affairs and the Bar Council of India, to oversee, guide and monitor the implementation of the proposed reforms, said the statement.
IANS
