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2mo ago

Bar Council of India Issues Show-Cause Notices Over Unapproved Online LL.M. Programmes

High courts have been asked to block recognition of degrees from institutions without the regulator’s sanction to safeguard academic standards.

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Hybrid, online LLM degrees to be invalid with Bar Council of India approval

Overview

  • The June 25 advisory by Justice Rajendra Menon affirmed that any LL.M. or equivalent programme offered online, distance or hybrid without prior approval is unauthorised and void.
  • Show-cause notices have been served or are pending against National Law Institute University (Bhopal), IIT Kharagpur, O.P. Jindal Global University (Sonipat) and National Law University (Delhi) for non-compliant course offerings.
  • High courts have been urged to ensure that unapproved qualifications are not recognised for employment, academic appointments, research registration or departmental promotions.
  • The UGC’s Open and Distance Learning Regulations 2020 along with the BCI’s 2008 and 2020 Legal Education Rules explicitly bar postgraduate law programmes via non-traditional modes without prior sanction.
  • The council warned that lack of real-time, interactive faculty-student engagement in remote LL.M. formats undermines essential legal reasoning and misleads prospective students about programme legitimacy.