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ILS Law College to become first law university in Maha
The Indian Law Society (ILS) Law College in Pune is in the final stages of becoming the first law university in Maharashtra even as it completed 100 years on Thursday
PUNE: The Indian Law Society (ILS) Law College in Pune is in the final stages of becoming the first law university in Maharashtra even as it completed 100 years on Thursday.
The proposal to become a private university had been submitted by the ILS Law College administration to the state government last year and the concerned authorities had visited the campus for verification. The wait is now on for the state government to pass the ILS Law University Bill in the state assembly.
Professor Deepa Paturkar, principal - additional charge, ILS Law College, said, “The process of ILS Law College becoming a private university is in its final stages as the required procedure for the same has been completed from our side. The application was submitted to the state government last year and subsequently in July 2023, the committee visited our campus for further verification. We are now waiting for the bill to be passed in the state assembly.”
“After submission of the application last year, there were some queries raised by the government and we even solved these queries. We are now almost at the end of the process and once we get university status, we will be the first law university in Maharashtra,” said Paturkar.
Earlier last year, ILS Law College received a letter of intent after which the committee reviewed it. The private university status will afford the institution academic freedom while designing new courses and reforming the assessment systems. The university status will be beneficial also because it will facilitate national and international collaborations.
The Indian Law Society established its law college in Pune on June 20, 1924. The law college was initially affiliated to the then Bombay University and began in the amphitheatre of Fergusson College. The law college was named ILS Law College in 1980 to distinguish it from other law colleges in the city.
The early days of the Indian Law Society’s law college date as far back as 1902 when J R Gharpure and P B Singhe decided to make a new beginning in the direction of a regularised system for imparting legal education. ‘The New Law Class, Bombay’ was thus started in 1903. After running the class for five years, it was thought desirable to start a regular law college, which would be affiliated to a university. Accordingly, the Fergusson College Law Class was started in 1908, conducted by Gharpure. More than 125 students were registered on the rolls. Within a few weeks however, the institution was disaffiliated from the Bombay University.
This experiment was still underway more than 15 years later. The scope for improvement was recognised and on March 4, 1923, a new society called the ‘Indian Law Society’ was inaugurated whose first president was Dr Sir Narayan Rao C Chandawarkar. It was proposed at the meeting that a private law college be set up in Pune. After preliminary preparations, the law college formally began operations on June 20, 1924 under the banner of the Indian Law Society. It was then known as ‘Poona Law College’. The society acquired 154 acres of land and the first building called the Saraswati Building came up in 1935. The foundation stone was laid at the hands of the late honourable Srinivas Shastri on January 7, 1935.
Paturkar said, “Apart from the centenary celebrations this year, we are planning to launch a new course in aviation and Space-related laws that are in demand since the past few years. We are working on the syllabus and once it is completed, the course will begin from this academic year. There are many more plans afoot once university status is given to ILS Law College.”
