27th - 28th January 2022

About School of Law

School of Law, is a part of CHRIST (Deemed to be University), Bangalore.The parent University, a premier educational institution, is an academicfraternity dedicated to the motto of ‘Excellence and Service’ and has analready proven history of success in the field of education. CHRIST, formerlyChrist College, has the rare distinction of being the first institution inKarnataka to be accredited by the National Assessment and AccreditationCouncil (NAAC), UGC, and currently has an A grade as accredited in 2016 forquality education. Located in a beautiful expansive campus of CHRIST,Bangalore, School of Law is an institute imparting world class legal educationnot only to students from various parts of the country but also from the MiddleEast and Mauritius. The courses are approved by the Bar Council of India.

The National Conference Committee is a faculty guided, student runcommittee which is entering its 12th glorious year and has been the host for 11successful national conferences.The committee organises various workshopsand seminars every year. This year to add to its glory the committee memberspropose to host webinars, online workshops, virtual research assistanceprogrammes and the flagship icon event, National Conference. For thisacademic year the committee shall work with various sub-teams (i.e., researchteam, tech team, creative crew, public relations) the members of which shall bespecialised in the same. National Conference Committee strives to publish anE-book after the event. The research articles submitted and presented of goodequality will be chosen in E-book after thorough scrutiny for publication. . Thevirtual platform has provided an opportunity to the committee to broaden itsreach and deliver an experience that has never been witnessed before.

About NATIONAL CONFERENCE COMMITTEE

Concept Note

True freedom requires the rule of law and justice and a judicial system inwhich the rights of some are not secured by the denial of rights to others. -

Jonathan Sacks

Democracy in India has been through a dynamic process of evolution sinceindependence in 1947. A vibrant thriving democracy, as in our country, oneought to marvel at the efficient yet complex functioning of the institutions andadministration of its powers. The events of the past one year and the enactmentof several legislations have posed different challenging questions with respectto rule of law, democratic norms and constitutional law as followed in India.

A democratic society's cornerstone is the rule of law. The judiciary isresponsible for upholding the rule of law, democratic norms and constitutionalvalues. If the judiciary is to efficiently carry out its responsibilities and powerswhile remaining faithful to the spirit in which they are entrusted, the dignityand authority of the courts, which have been entrusted, must be preserved andprotected at all costs. The principles of Separation of Powers and the Rule ofLaw have to be interpreted in line with the conscience of the constitution. TheTribunal Reforms Act, 2021 proposing changes in the process of constitutingtribunals has become a subject of controversy. Tribunals in India have beenweakened by the enormous number of vacancies for Members andChairpersons, as well as the excessive delay in replacing them. The Actproposes to abolish several appellate bodies and reassign their powers to theoverburdened high courts or commercial civil courts which lack specialisationand is detrimental to decision making process. There are deliberationsunderway among the legal fraternity that the enactment of the legislation wasultra vires the government’s constitutional prerogatives and also the Actabrogates the principle of judicial independence in a deliberate attempt tooverride the previous judgements of the top court.

The reality is unfortunate as the trial process in India takes years withseveral pending cases in the courts in India. There is a need for urgentreforms in this regard. Emphasis needs to be given to rule of law especiallywith respect to issues of state surveillance and the Right to Privacy. Thealleged use of state surveillance brings the question of serious threatsassociated with freedom and dignity. The enactment of InformationTechnology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules,2021 similarly has been marred by controversy regarding the allegedviolation of Freedom of Speech and Right to Privacy. This has been seen bymany as arbitrarily used to target individuals, crush dissent and is against theRight to Privacy of citizens.

Understanding how to effectively safeguard fundamental rights, democraticnorms and standards, as well as how to apply them equitably remains adifficulty, especially in a diverse country such as India. Reservations inIndia has always been a volatile topic. With demands of caste-based censusfor the purpose of identifying citizens based on caste communities, theargument posed can be seen under the garb of delivering schemes andwelfare to lower caste communities but on the contrary may also be utilisedto enhance caste-based vote bank politics for political agenda. Theenactment of Population Control Bills has been a matter of grave concernthroughout the country as it brings upon several legal challenges such asfemale foeticide and has implications on personal autonomy and alsoreligious beliefs in a secular nation

Judiciary is not always seen as an institution whose decision is alwayscorrect but seen as an institution rendered by individuals known for theirwisdom, integrity, character and impartiality. The judiciary intervenes inorder to safeguard constitutional values and goals, and fundamental rights.It's unclear if technology will be used to help create a more equal judicialsystem, but it's clear that it will require a comprehensive national reformapproach which includes the implementation of ICT. The National LitigationPolicy, formulated by the Ministry of Law and Justice of the Government of

India, was the most recent move made in this regard.

As a member of the International Community, India has an obligation not onlyto maintain the justice delivery mechanism within the country and upkeepconstitutional values, but also maintain it at a global level. Most nations havecreated a comprehensive extradition framework to achieve this aim, however,there is a need for drawing a parity between different nations to ensure a muchmore efficient network system which is rooted in the aspect of mutualunderstanding in order to combat such injustices faced at the hands of fugitives.

There is a wide array of contemporary issues that plague the nation anddemands attention. The upkeep of constitutional values is imperative when it isabout the rights of common citizens and the obligations of the public servantand the elected representatives. The request of Government of Kerala to dismisscriminal proceedings against its MLAs who were involved in violent ruckus inthe legislative assembly and destruction of public property in the assembly wasdenied by the Supreme Court. To contemplate whether such privileges grantedto the members of legislative assemblies are misused invariably raises legalissues regarding its limits. Following the nations' failed attempts to applyexisting laws to cyberspace, the need for a new and radical regulatoryframework for controlling internet pornography has emerged. Unfortunately,the progress made in this regard by the Indian law and enforcement machineryis not evident when we draw a parallel with other countries. Hence, it is a direneed that we analyse the challenges that pop up whilst attempting to regulatecyber pornography amidst the Indian backdrop, as well as simultaneouslycoming up with effective solutions which can be successfully implemented.

Theme and Sub-Themes

EMERGING TRENDS IN RULE OF LAW, DEMOCRATIC NORMS ANDCONSTITUTIONAL VALUES

SUB THEME 1: RULE OF LAW1. Tribunal Reforms and Judicial Independence2. Access to Justice and its Transformation in India 3. Expediting the Trial Process in India4. State Surveillance and Right to Privacy

SUB THEME 2: DEMOCRATIC NORMS1. Regulation of OTT Platform: Censoring Issues and limitations2. Anti-Conversion Laws: Is It a Threat to Secularism and Fundamental Rights? 3. Trends in Reservation Policy in India: An Evaluation4. Population Control Bills and its Constitutional Ramifications

SUB THEME 3: TRENDS IN JUDICIAL PROCESS IN INDIA1. The Digitisation of Indian Judicial process: Challenges and the Way Forward2. Implementation of AI and Digitisation of Judicial system3. National Litigation Policy and Its implementation

SUB THEME 4: MISCELLANEOUS1. Fugitive Justice and Reciprocity Between States 2. The Legality of Withdrawal of Prosecution3. Cyber Pornography: Regulatory Challenges

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

Sub-themeTitle of the PaperName of the Author(s)Name of the Institution E-mail Address Postal Address Contact number

A cover letter mentioning the Name of the Author(s), Course, Year of Study(if applicable), Name of the College/University (if applicable), ProfessionalPosition (if applicable), Title and Theme of the Paper, with Postal Address,Email Address and Contact Number.

Registration form & Payment - The details of the same shall be intimated tothe participants whose abstracts get selected.

The abstract should not exceed 300 words, and must be accompanied with acover page stating:

The abstract file shall be named as: <Theme number>_<full name of the author(s)>. For eg: i) Single Authorship:Theme1_RajeevShankar ii) Co-Authorship:Theme1_RajeevShankar&RahulMohan

All submissions of the abstracts for the E-Conference must be electronicallysubmitted. Click here to submit your abstract.

The word limit of the full paper shall be 3000 - 4000 words (excludingfootnotes/annexure/reports etc.) and must be accompanied with thefollowing details:.

FORMATTING REQUIREMENTS

The main text of the full paper and the abstract should be in Times New

Roman with font size 12 and line spacing of 1.5.

The footnotes should be in Times New Roman, font size 10 with spacing of

1.0 (Endnotes are not permitted)

One inch margins should be maintained on all four sides of the pages.

Citation Style: Bluebook, 20th edition.

The abstract and full paper have to mandatorily be submitted in .pdf format

only.

Co-authorship is permitted to a maximum of two authors and at least one

author must attend the E Conference to present the paper.

No Proxy presentations are allowed.

The School of Law, CHRIST in keeping with its mandate of publishing

original works only, adopts a stringent anti-plagiarism policy. Any paper

containing any unattributed work is thus liable to be rejected.

NOTE

Important Dates

Abstract Submission

Communication of Acceptance of Abstract

Last date for Registration and Payment

Submission of Full Papers

CISCO WebEx shall be used for paper presentation and conduct of NationalOnline Conference. Further, details on the usage and registration to theplatform will be shared to the participants at a later stage.

Platform

December 15, 2021

December 20, 2021

January 10, 2022

January 15, 2022

Registration fee and Payment details

1. For Students: Rs.800/-for single authorship and Rs.1200/- for co-authorship2. For Research Scholars, Academicians and Professionals: Rs.1000/- forSingle authorship and Rs.1400/- for co-authorship.

Rewards

1. E-Certificate to every participant who duly submits and presents the paper.2. Publication of the best articles under each sub-theme in the proposed E-book carrying ISBN number.

DIRECTOR Dr Fr Benny Thomas

School of Law, CHRIST (Deemed to be University)

CHAIRPERSONDr Jayadevan S. Nair

Dean, School of Law, CHRIST (Deemed to be University)

CO-CHAIRPERSON Dr Sapna S.

HOD, School of Law, CHRIST (Deemed to be University)

FACULTY CO-ORDINATORS Dr Jayadevan S. Nair

Dr Gopi Ranganath V. Ms Pavithra R.

STUDENT CONVENORSMs Anusha Ann Paul

anusha.paul@law.christuniversity.in+91-9538640385

Mr Sahil Ujawane

sahil.ujawane@law.christuniversity.in+91-8983021279

Conference Committee

slcuconference@law.christuniversity.in

https://slcuconference.wordpress.com/

slcu_national.conference.comm

FOR ANY FURTHER DETAILS CONTACT: