Srinagar: The Bar Council of India (BCI) has denied recognition to the Law degree offered to the students by the Central University of Kashmir (CUK).
The course is not being recognised by the council as the university has not completed the formalities to get the recognition of the BCI.
The revelation came to fore after the law graduates of the university complained about the denial of license by the Bar Council of India (BCI) as the university has failed to submit the fee to get the recognition of the council.
A group of aggrieved students said that the pass outs of the Law department of the CUK who move outside J&K are not allowed to practice law without proper license from the BCI.
“The law students who join lower courts and high courts within J&K are not asked for the license of BCI to practice. But the problem is faced by those students who join courts outside J&K,” a group of agitated students said.
“The problem is when we apply for a license, we are denied because the CUK has not submitted the registration fee in BCI for several years. The fee has to be paid yearly,” the law graduates said.
The students said that the university administration was supposed to pay the yearly registration fee to BCI in order to get the recognition of the council for the university and the law degree offered by the university.
“But when we go there, we don’t find the name of CUK among the recognised universities in BCI. When we inquired about it, we were told that the university has not paid the registration fee,” a student said.
The aggrieved students said the passouts of the department in 2012 went outside and were given the license by BCI as the university had paid the fees.
“Another batch of passout students applied for the license but could not get it as the university had not paid the fee. Recently, four to five students of the 2020 pass out batch went outside and applied for a license and faced the same problem,” the student said.
Vice Chancellor (VC) CUK, Prof Mehrajuddin Mir when contacted admitted that the law graduates of CUK who move outside were facing problems to practice law in court as they do not get the license from BCI.
“We had taken up the matter with BCI but the process was delayed for unknown reasons. I have also written to the Chief Justice of India about the issue,” he said.
He said some time ago, a team from BCI visited the CUK and a private college for inspection.
“The private college was granted recognition but our case is pending for unknown reasons. Our file is not processed. Our registrar has also taken up the matter with the BCI,” he said.
The VC said the university was looking into the issue and the matter would be resolved very soon.