Supreme Court judge JK Maheshwari said on Thursday that the level of faculty in the national law universities should be improved to uplift the state of legal education in the country along with their standards.

Speaking at the Bharat Shiksha Summit 2025’s session on Legal Education and Training: Bridging Theory and Practice, Justice Maheshwari said practical legal training should also be improved upon and revitalised. In this context, he noted that moot court competitions are held regularly and should focus on real-world cases that land up in India’s courts instead of a corporate law case as is often the case with moot courts.

Referring to the ongoing debate on Artificial Intelligence, Justice Maheshwari said artificial intelligence is just that: artificial intelligence. Intelligence is natural and AI is man-made, he underlined. Speaking on the necessity of inculcating ethics, he said ethical training in legal education is its soul. While people cannot be trained in ethics since it comes with birth and basic nurturing, a sound moral base is required to be ethical, he said. Brushing away the abstract nature of the word ethics, he said it is a very real lived experience and needs to be built into legal professionals if they do not have it.

Ahead of Justice Maheshwari, Attorney General of India R. Venkataramani handled the questions put forward by National Law Institute University, Bhopal Vice-Chancellor Prof. (Dr.) S. Surya Prakash on the standardization of legal education by the Bar Council of India with disarming grace. The AG said law students should first of all understand where they intend to go in the social order that prevails in the country.

Venkataramani said law is a part of the social order and its students, throughout their lives, have to keep in mind the many divisions that exist in society including the economic ones. The Supreme Court of India is a mirror to Indian society and solves many of its problems that find their way to the courtroom.

He exhorted law students to ask themselves every minute if they and their work will make any difference to the world and of what kind, and continue to practice the self-questioning well into their careers.

Earlier, Prof. (Dr.) S. Surya Prakash had said legal education in India was coming up in three streams of law colleges, state law universities and national law universities. All three differ in terms of standards, quality, facilities and cost, he said. Thus, education has itself become a divisive force, he noted.

With such varying standards, Prof Surya Prakash appealed to the Bar Council of India to be strict and set standards since it equates the LLB degree given by all three streams at par.

National Law University Delhi Vice-Chancellor Prof GS Bajpai said the ball is in the BCI’s court to fix quality issues plaguing legal education. He made an earnest appeal to all universities to be liberal spaces that would allow students to exchange ideas, however frivolous they are, so that the campus is free from the rigor mortis of academic drudgery.

He said NLU Delhi has introduced a no-detention policy as an example of free-flow of ideas, and it is being examined for implementing in other NLUs. Prof Bajpai asked students to be active as citizens, especially in legal education.

Senior Advocate Pradeep Rai said English has played the role of a connecting language in India over time and said Hindi has not achieved that status because it has not made room for words from other languages. He said people over the last many decades have not used Hindi as an assimilatory language. On legal education, he said efforts should be made consciously to evolve and improve legal education despite the many roadblocks.

Union Minority Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju on Thursday strongly defended the Waqf (Amendment) Bill, 2025, amid ongoing debate in the Rajya Sabha. He dismissed apprehensions that the bill might negatively impact Muslim interests and emphasized that the Waqf Board’s operations, management, and benefits will remain exclusive to the Muslim community.

Rijiju rejects allegations, outlines purpose of amendment

Addressing criticism, Rijiju categorically denied that the bill undermines constitutional rights or religious autonomy. “Non-Muslims cannot interfere in Waqf Board affairs. Its creation, management and beneficiaries are confined to Muslims,” he stated. He added that any Muslim can still manage property under a trust without hindrance.

Explaining the role of the Waqf Board, Rijiju likened it to a Charity Commissioner, responsible for ensuring proper management of religious endowments. The proposed amendments aim to boost transparency, enforce accountability, and enhance the Board’s capacity.

Ownership proof made mandatory to avoid misuse

A significant provision in the amendment mandates documented proof of ownership before designating any property as Waqf. This move seeks to correct past practices where claims by the Waqf Board could automatically label properties as Waqf without verifying ownership.

Extensive consultations and public feedback

Rijiju highlighted the bill’s extensive pre-legislative process. According to him, over one crore suggestions were received from the public, and a Parliamentary Committee carried out consultations across ten major cities, including Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, and Hyderabad.

He traced earlier reform attempts, citing the 1976 Congress-era inquiry and the 2006 Sachar Committee Report, both of which emphasized the need for digitisation and strengthening of the Waqf Board. The number of Waqf properties has increased from 4.9 lakh to 8.72 lakh, with their income potential now significantly higher than the Rs 163 crore annual income reported earlier.

Implementing long-pending recommendations

Rijiju mentioned findings from the earlier Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) led by K. Rehman Khan, which pointed to poor infrastructure, lack of skilled manpower, and insufficient funds. The JPC had recommended establishing a centralized data bank and implementing structured leasing policies.

He accused previous governments of inaction, stating, “Committees were set up during the Congress and UPA rule, yet they failed to act. The Modi government is implementing reforms that they did not dare to.”

Contrasting the present and past efforts, he highlighted that while the UPA-led JPC in 2013 involved 13 members and consulted 14 states, the current JPC had 31 members, held 36 meetings, and consulted stakeholders across 25 states.

Rijiju asserted that the Waqf (Amendment) Bill, 2025, is a step toward ensuring efficiency, transparency, and better utilisation of Waqf properties, all while safeguarding the interests and autonomy of the Muslim community.

Delhi Teachers University Vice-Chancellor Professor Dhananjay Joshi said that India is a country which gives due importance to teachers as it is a Guru Pradhan country.

Speaking at the session Education Without Borders at the Bharat Shiksha Summit 2025, Prof. Joshi said the need of the hour is to train teachers in the country. “Today there is a need to save teachers. We need to work on teachers,” he said.

On the critical importance of teacher-centric reforms within the New Education Policy 2020, Prof. Joshi argued that focusing on the development of teachers is essential to creating a Viksit Bharat through a well-equipped and motivated teaching workforce.

Prof. (Dr.) Prabhat Ranjan, Vice-Chancellor of DY Patil International University, noted the importance of the NEP in veering away from the focus on English and to mother tongues in the country. He shared his university’s innovative approaches aimed at redefining education in India and emphasized the importance of bridging gaps between traditional and digital learning methodologies.

Dismissing university rankings put out annually by publications, Prof. Ranjan said the work of an educator is to ensure students learn leaving all such attempts at publicity on the wayside. There is no other focus required for an educational institution apart from focusing on students and research, he added. Rankings will come and go, he said.

Underlining the importance of being open to learning at any stage in life, Prof. Ranjan said that there is a need to learn new things every moment.

IGNOU Sanskrit Professor Kaushal Panwar, a Bharat Shiksha Sammelan awardee, said he was proud to be an Indian and what is present in this country cannot be anywhere else. 

Educators at the summit underscored how access to online tutorials and educational content has transformed learning. They highlighted that the students, even in rural areas, now have unprecedented access to knowledge. However, they also stressed the evolving role of teachers, particularly in “flip classrooms,” where students engage in discussions after reviewing study materials on their own.