Advocate General Prabhuling K Navadgi, defending the State Government on 31st August before a division bench of Justice B V Nagarathna and Justice Ravi V Hosmani pointed out the object of two state legislations which have excluded NLSIU is that, the students who pass out of this state university (recognised by UGC as so), and are likely to stay in the State of Karnataka, the reservation is for them, and not restricted to them being a Kannadiga.”
The state government mentioned that “Object of the Act is to somehow ensure a portion of the students passing out from NLS stay back and serve the state. The criteria for the reservation are interchangeable but the ultimate object remains intact.”
The further submissions by Advocate Navadgi will be on Tuesday.
These submissions are in light of the amendment passed by the Karnataka State Assembly in March, passed the National Law School of India (Amendment) Act, 2020, which received the Karnataka Governor’s assent on April 27th, 2020. As per this, NLSIU show reserve horizontally twenty-five percent (25%) of seats for ‘students of Karnataka’. The Court to this has remarked, “Law schools in other states fall out of the fact that NLS seat capacity is limited. Students could not get admission on merits, therefore other states came forward to replicate the NLS Model. Therefore, they said we will give reservation for our state children. Thus, the object of establishing NLSIU is not to provide reservation.”
