Students from different states participated in “Client Counselling Competition and Capacity Building Workshop on Legal Literacy and Free Legal Aid” held at Central University of Punjab
Bathinda: The Pro Bono Club of the Department of Law at Central University of Punjab under the dynamic leadership of Prof Raghavendra Prasad Tiwari, the Vice-chancellor and District Legal Services Authority, Bathinda successfully organized a ‘Client Counseling Competition and Capacity Building Workshop on Legal Literacy and Free Legal Aid’ on Saturday at University Campus. The program was organized under the aegis of Pro Bono Scheme, Department of Justice, Ministry of Law and Justice, Govt. of India. This event focused on promoting a healthy lawyer-client relationship and providing awareness regarding free legal assistance to the weaker section of society. A total of 12 teams across various educational institutions from Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan participated.
The guests at the event were Shri Suresh Kumar Goyal, CJM and Secretary, DLSA, Bathinda, Shri Amit Tyagi, Deputy Legal Advisor, Dept. of Legal Affairs, Ms. Sneha Sharma, Project Manager, Pro Bono Scheme, Dept. of Justice, Govt. of India, Adv. Seema Sharma and Adv. Kapil Kumar.
The Client Counseling Competition was divided into two stages namely (i) Client Counseling; and (ii) Drafting of Legal Notice. The Client Competition stage was based on a problem of Family Law i.e. Matrimony and Divorce. Whereas, the Drafting of Legal Notice was based on Consumer Protection Laws.
The participants in the client counseling stage performed as mediators between two parties. They discussed laws relating to marriage, judicial separation, divorce, maintenance and remedies. It was deliberated that both the wife and husband are entitled to maintenance as per the material facts of the concerned case. It was informed by the judges of the event that the agreement signed between the conflicting parties during the mediation is binding to both parties.
In the drafting of the legal notice stage, the participants were given a problem based on Consumer Protection Rights and Banking Laws. All the teams drafted the legal notice based on the given problem as per the rules, regulations and guidelines of the RBI, SEBI, SBI and Central Bank. Each team was given 30 minutes to draft the legal notice based on the problem provided.
Shri Suresh Goyal interacted with the participants and answered their queries related to the functioning of DLSA and other legal issues. Ms. Sneha detailed the functioning of Pro Bono Club and the role of the government in ensuring effective implementation and use of various legal tools such as Nyay Bandhu and Tele-Law App.
In the concluding session, Prof. Tarun Arora, Head and Dean, Department of Law, School of Legal Studies, Central University of Punjab declared the result and congratulated all the winners. He encouraged everyone and mentioned that the participation of students in events like these is more important than winning awards. The team from GHG Institute of Law, Ludhiana was declared as the winner while the team from Baba Farid Law College emerged as the runners-up and the team from Chandigarh University bagged the third position in the competition.
The program concluded with the Vote of Thanks by Dr. Sukhwinder Kaur, Faculty, Department of Law followed by refreshments for all the visitors and the hosts.