The Countryside

After the priliminary rounds, we found time to visit La Plaine, a village town on the France border...it took us 20 minutes by train











Risked my life for this one...


Thats France on the other side...


Was DDLJ shot here....just asking?

Some Eye-catchers

Perhaps the closest I'll get in this life...


Roy in a sublime blend


A BMW scooter...our Vespa is very common too...


Cars galore...




Fashion (shoot)...


Tram...


Modern or Postmodern?


The sun sets around 9:00 PM in April...the Nightlife starts around ten...


Haloed...in the train to Bern

The Food Scene

This is what we got for lunch on most days...and it cost around 10 Franks or 400 rupees...of course, we used sponsorship money.



The Cafeteria at the Univeristy of Geneva...


Believe me, it didn't taste great...


The IOC had a tie up with this restaurant for the participants' dinner...it was located inside the scenic campus of the International Relations Institute by the lake.


I'm sure the European participants were loving this food...we, along with the American, Australian and the other Asian teams had a tough time.


Mushroom, chicken and rice...was better than other days...


The best food we had was the buffet breakfast at the hotel...the menu was the same everyday but was diverse enough to try something new every morning....


The last supper...my face tells how much I relished it ....that's the Columbian team...behind them, the LSE team...


Notwithstanding the food, the dinner table was the best place to interact with the other participants...the New York University team.

The WTO Moot Story!

As promised, here I am with stories from Switzerland. This will be done in parts, each with a different theme. Let me first tell you people about what this competition was all about.

There is this organization called The European Law Students’ Association (ELSA) which organizes this moot court competition on WTO law every year. This event is sponsored by a European Law Firm called O’ Çonnor and Company, APCO, and the Cambridge University Press. The University of Geneva provided its facilities for its staging this year. The World Trade Organisation provides technical support to this competition.

The moot court problem came out in September last year. It deals with a dispute arising between a WTO Member that subsidizes its agri-industry, and a WTO Member that does not subsidize its agri-industry and hence believes it is impeded from competing fairly on the world market in certain agri-products. The Member which subsidizes its agri-industry does not pay out more subsidies than its scheduled commitments permit under the WTO Agreement on Agriculture, but the complainant nevertheless claims that the agri-subsidies are in violation of both the Agreement on Agriculture and the Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures.

It was a very complicated problem which required us to research all over the country in the November break. We did most of our research at the National Law School, Bangalore and cannot thank its library staff enough for having extended to us all possible help. Prof. G.V. Ajjappa who taught us Jurisprudence-I and Legal Methods is well respected at NLS and was instrumental in getting us access to NLS Library and accommodation at the boys' hostel there. It is an irony that we could beat NLS in the regional round. The IIM- Bangalore library was another place we researched in. The libraries of NALSAR, Hyderabad, (got access with the help of Sagee Sasikumar who earlier taught at our law school) and NUJS, Kolkata too helped us in our research. Although, our own library lacked books in this highly specialised area of trade law, the online legal database it subscribes to was enough to provide us with a legion of articles related to our case. The case was so complicated that we could not find a single person in the law faculties we visited who could have helped us crack (understand) the problem. With all due respect to the people we consulted, we found them as clueless as we were.
















NLS by night.... and their library complex...















At IIM-B...













That's Manu...fellow law schoolite who is based in Bangalore. While we explored the libraries, he provided us with the required logistical support.













On my way back home from Bangalore, I stopped by in Hyderabad to look into the NALSAR library...Basava, my batchmate who hails from this charming city, ensured that I enjoyed every moment of my stay there when not in NALSAR. Here, sipping coffee by the Hussein Sagar lake in perhaps the shot of my life!

It was only after we read some of the WTO panel reports (run into hundreds of pages) related to our case that we finally cracked the problem in December. Once we could do that, it took us about forty days to prepare our written submissions for each side. The three of us had divided our work to meet the 15th Jan deadline. I can’t remember having worked harder in my life than I did in these forty days. The proofreading and final touches kept us from sleeping for thirty six consecutive hours just before the submission date.













Slogging for the written submissions at the hostel...













That sleepless last day...

Our regional oral round (for the Gulf and South Asia) was supposed to be held in March to select two teams for the world finals. Owing to some communication gap between the regional round organizers, a Mumbai based law firm and the International Organising Committee (IOC), it was cancelled one day before we were to leave for Delhi, the venue for the round. The IOC decided that they would now select teams on the basis of written submission scores. Out of all the law schools from South Asia which participated, HNLU, Raipur and NUJS, Kolkata got selected. So, after all we had understood the problem correctly and the content our written submissions met the required standards.

The IOC had organised regional rounds in South America, Northern Europe, Southern Europe, Asia, Asia- Pacific and South Asia and an International Written Round for North America and Africa to select eighteen teams for the Final Oral Round to be held at Geneva. Around seventy teams had registered for the competition from the world over of which eighteen got selected.

In my last post, I have already told you about what happened to us. We were lauded for making it that far on our own, but believe me we could have done a lot better. Actually we had to raise around hundred and fifty thousand rupees (around 3,300 USD) to meet our airfare and participation fee which included accommodation, food and administration costs for the three of us. Our selection was announced on the 16th of March and we were to report at Geneva on the 25th of April. In between, we had our end semester examination from the 6th April to 14th April. The Govt. of Chhattisgarh (after several applications and a meeting with the Additional Chief Secretary) provided for our airfare which came to around ninety thousand rupees. Jindal Power and Steel, and Allahabad Bank gave another sixty and we had raised just about enough funds to meet our budget. All these funds were routed through the University in the form of cheques. Encashing them was another pain in the neck. We were to leave for Bombay on the morning of 23rd of April. Our bank was forced to circumvent certain policies to ensure that we had hundred and fifty thousand rupees in cash on the evening of Saturday, 22nd April, 2006. I will never forget that day.

We had purchased the air tickets long back by putting our own money then. So, we now had on us, rupees fifty thousand each, in cash as we left for Bombay by the morning train. The entire episode had ensured that we had not practised even once after the announcement of our results, a fact that pains me even today. If only we could arrange for the funds a bit more easily. So here we were, on a Bombay bound train, under prepared for the oral rounds, on our way to Geneva to face the Global Challenge.

The weather was surprisingly pleasant in Bombay as we got off the train that morning. It was only after visiting four hotels that we finally found an affordable abode near the station. The room was air conditioned but was so small that three of could not stand together in it at the same time. One had to be on the bed to ensure that the other two could at least move. We soon got ready and headed for the commercial centre of the city to purchase Euros and Swiss Franks. My team mates (one lives in Cochin and the other in Calcutta) seemed more than interested in downtown Bombay, and before we could realise that we had spent the entire day window shopping, after having watched ‘Being Cyrus’ at Regal, and having a flavoursome meal at my favourite, Baghdadis, it was already evening. Regular readers must have deciphered as to who led them to these places.

Soon we headed back to the hotel at Dadar, packed our stuff for the last time, had a very Indian dinner and finally headed for the airport at nine. Here we were, a group of three undergrads minutes away from boarding a Swiss Air flight to what would be our first voyage to Europe.

The passenger sitting next to me was a Bombay based businessman who deals with lighting events and functions. He was on his way to Frankfurt to see a show related to his business to meet the tastes of his elite clients at Bombay. He had travelled all over Europe and warned me that most non-English Europeans would not speak English even when they knew it. This man had also had a brush with our criminal justice system when he filed a case against a client one of whose cheques had bounced. So while he told me about his case, I recalled a legion of such cases where my boss had defended the guilty party. He knew about him but felt that his fee was too high for the amount involved in his case. Nevertheless, another name added to my contacts in Bombay.

We landed in Zurich at around 6:30 AM local time. It’s another state-of-the art airport. Our flight to Geneva was at ten and we lazed around and window-shopped till we took off. Among the other things at this glittering airport, a Mont Blanc pen for 4000 Swiss Franks (hundred and fifty thousand rupees-our entire expenditure limit) and an Armani suit for 2000 Swiss Franks would remain ingrained on my memory for a long time to come.

At the Zurich Airport

It took us just thirty minutes to reach Geneva from Zurich. On coming out into the airport lobby, we saw a pretty lady carrying a board with ELSA written on top of it. On approaching her, we found that she was not from ELSA but had come there to receive the team from St Peter’sberg, Russia. Just as we came out of the airport and saw signs in French and German all over the place, we knew that we were in for some trouble. We first headed for the adjoining train station only to come out again and wait for a taxi. The taxi, a Mercedes was driven by a hefty guy who apparently could not speak any English. Thankfully, he understood the address we showed and took us to Novotel Gene´ve Centre (a four star hotel), a ten minute ride which cost us 33 Franks (Rs. 1200). We had by now fathomed that Switzerland is one of the most expensive places in the world.


They put us up here...


Our room...

We paid our participation fee at the registration desk, kept our luggage and came out soon to have our lunch. We had not eaten anything at the Zurich airport after finding the rates there to be too high. Our hearts sank when we saw similar rates for every thing at Geneva too. We found a McDonald's nearby and had a regular combo meal for 11 Franks each (Rs. 400). Thank heavens that our participation fee included food too. We were supposed to get meals from the next day onwards. The draw of lots was held in the evening which was followed by a cocktail party. Finally, we had something without any inhibitions.



The draw of lots.

We commuted on tram from our place of stay to the University of Geneva and each ride cost us three franks. So we had to spend at least six Franks (around two hundred rupees) from our pocket everyday.


Ready for the first moot.

Given the fact that we had come without any practise, we did very well to impress the judges in the first preliminary round against Howard University, Washington. Dr. Arthur Appleton, White & Case, Geneva, Dr. Laura Nielsen, University of Copenhagen, Denmark and Ms. Hannah Irfan, WTO Legal Affairs Division were the three judges for our first moot. The next day, we were up against Javerian University, Columbia who were the champions of the South American Regional Round. I think we did well even here. However, the judges Dr. Jan Bohanes, WTO Appellate Body Secretariat, Prof. Christian Tietje, University of Halle, Germany and Ms. Barbara Oliveria did not like our approach of dealing with the prior rulings of the WTO panels as flawed when not supporting our case. In fact, we even fumbled at some questions. If only we got some time to practise the respondent’s side. Believe me, we had not practised properly even once. However, when the semi- finalists were announced in the evening, we found ourselves ranked higher that the Columbian team in oral submission scores. It was disappointing to not make it to the semis though. However, we were ranked above ten other teams, most European (Russia, Finland, Italy, Germany, Sweden, Norway), two American (Howard, Dukes) an African and a Taiwanese team. The only American Law School ranked above us was that of the New York University. And almost all of these teams had coaches. The grand final was staged at the WTO Headquarters. The teams to reach the final were the London School of Economics and Political Science and the University of Sydney. Let me also tell you here that we along with NUJS, Calcutta and the team from Columbia were the only undergrads. International Trade Law is primarily considered a post graduate subject.


With Felipe Serrano from Bogota, Columbia at the announcement of semi-finalists...


The cocktail party that followed...

It was a wonderful experience to see the World Trade Organisation. Getting inside involved a long process. Our passports were deposited at the entrance in exchange for identification badges. The judges for the finals had the biggest names associated with WTO Dispute Resolution Process including the Deputy Director- General, Alejandro Jara. It was a well contested final with the University of Sydney emerging as the winners. We had seen their semi-final too. They were brilliant and deserved to win. Let me tell you that there were Indians on both teams. The LSE team had two Indians including one of the speakers. Both of them had graduated last year (one from ILS, Pune and other from Amity, Delhi) and are pursuing their LLM in LSE. The Australian team too had a girl who was an ethnic Indian. She was a brilliant speaker.


Inside the WTO, overlooking team LSE (far right).


The Aussie team...among other things, they won scholrships to study a course at the World Trade Institute, Bern.


The grand panel of the grand final...


Behind the WTO building...


At Lake Geneva, right behind the WTO compound...


The WTO Entrance...

At the end of it, given the kind of exposure we got, I rate the entire experience as a highly rewarding one. I find myself very close to deciding upon going for a Master’s Degree in International Trade Law from an American or European University after graduating. However, I still have two years to graduate and you never know. Given a chance, I would certainly like to help the next team from the Law School which takes up this moot. This was in all likelihood my last moot as a participant. It’s high time to work on publishing something. Mooting consumes too much of your time and energy and its impossible to come out with a paper while working on a moot. However, it is a highly enriching experience. We get to learn more than we would ever in the classroom.

Having said that, the proposition of going to a foreign land on a fully paid trip, remains an alluring one. So I won’t promise anything. Yet, deep down in my heart I know that its time to move on.

Here in Geneva

People!!! This is where I'm right now...at the lobby of our Hotel at Geneva...


We were up against the Howard University, Washington D.C. in the first round...we did well to beat them....here, just after the moot...


Then came the Javerian Univeristy, Columbia...was a very fiery moot...will fill in the details later...this was taken just before the moot...


We didn't make it to the semis...got the 8th rank in about 70 teams which had registered for this competition on International Trade Law...wanted to do better though...

Flying back to India on the 1st of May...The Finals take place tommorow at the WTO Headquarters here between the London School of Economics and the University of Sydney...we'll see that and head for Bern, well known city of this country...then to Zurich to finally fly back to India on the 1st of May....

Godwilling, I'll post soon with alll the details...

P.S.- French food sucks!

Rang de Basanti and John Rawls

Please don’t frown at the title. Actually another semester has come to an end at my law school and it’s about time I dashed off a piece on a theme that has kept me captivated for quite sometime now. Before I introduce it, let me give you a general background. Jurisprudence or the philosophy of law is something every law student is expected to be well versed with. It is true that no client would ever seek to be lectured upon the concept of ‘justice’ or the philosophical underpinnings of the concept of rights and duties, yet as my teacher once said, “it will be assumed that a lawyer has knowledge of the theoretical underpinning of the professional expertise he claims.” Just as an aeroplane is a practical machine which works only if its design is based upon sound aerodynamic theory, a lawyer without knowledge of jurisprudence is no lawyer at all.

Having done Jurisprudence-I (an introductory paper on the nature and functions of law) in the 2nd year, I was anxiously looking forward to Jurisprudence-II this semester, which deals with concepts like ownership, possession, the nature of rights and duties and most importantly the theories of justice. I am glad that our course teacher was good enough to have effectively communicated these theories while leaving many a minds ignited.

What I propose to do here is examine the current state of affairs in our country in the light of certain theories of justice. Rang de Basanti, a recent Indian movie on the state of affairs in our country would serve as a model for proper elucidation.

With the march of civilization, there are bound to be people who will be dissatisfied with the system as it does not give them their due. Our forefathers fought against the British rule because they believed that it did not give them their due. The Bangladeshis rose up against Pakistan as they thought that they were not getting their due. So, it all boils to what is due to the people, i.e., what the people deserve to get. Now this is exactly what the theories of justice deal with. Over the years, philosophers have tried to identify certain principles of justice which help in determining what is due to the people. However, justice is a very vague concept. People’s understanding of justice differs from society to society. For instance, given a chance, a rich man who has earned a lot of money would not want the state to tax his income. A poor beggar on the other hand would want the state to abolish all the beggary prohibition laws. So when every one speaks from his own selfish point of view it becomes impossible to have such principles of justice which would be acceptable to one and all.

To answer this question, John Rawls in his book called the Theory of Justice which came out in 1971 refers us to a hypothetical situation called the ‘Original Position.’ For him, this refers back to the time before the beginning of civilization when man lived in the state of nature. There, every individual was completely detached and had no biases. So, in arriving at his principles of justice, he looks at them from the perspective of an unbiased individual living in the state of nature having nothing to do with the affairs of the modern world.

He says that when such unbiased people deliberate on the principles of justice which will help in determining as to what would be due each of them, the first thing they would agree upon would be maximum liberty for all compatible with the like liberty of others, i.e., every individual should have the freedom to do what he likes and this freedom should be the same for all.

Next comes the question of exercise of these freedoms (which leads to all the problems). Some people exercise their freedom more effectively than others. For example, all the degree holders in India have the freedom to appear for the Civil Services Examination. There is equality of opportunity for all. However, few chose to do so (an exercise of freedom), and even fewer get selected (some worked harder than others-another exercise of freedom). So by exercising freedoms, some people become successful while some others don’t. This goes to show that the exercise of freedoms leads to creation of positions of inequality. For instance, A, a graduate while exercising his freedoms passed the Civil Services Examination and became an IAS officer. Now this position of A is that of inequality in the sense that he is no longer on the same footing as the other graduates who had the chance to appear for the exam or who appeared and did not get through, i.e. he is no longer equal to them.

This leads Rawls to the second principle of justice. He says that an individual’s position of inequality can be justified only if it is for the benefit of the least advantaged member of the society. So in the above illustration, A’s position of inequality (IAS Officer) will be justified only when he honestly works in the interest of the nation for the benefit of the least advantaged person in the society, i.e., A’s each action must trickle down certain benefits to the least advantaged. So while the position of inequality of an honest Prime Minister may be justified, that of a Gangster can never be. While the latter might be a very benevolent person who hands out doles to the poor, his criminal actions against the state would ultimately harm the interest of the poorest of the poor.

The best part about Rawls’ theory is that it applies to one and all. It does not differentiate between the State and an individual. So his theory rings true for professions based on intellectual attainment like engineers, doctors and lawyers as much as it does for a Government Officer or a Minister. For Rawls, this and only this is the solution to all the social problems and tensions.

Rawls’ criticizers point out that why should a person who has effectively exercised his freedoms be responsible to those who haven’t. Prof. Upendra Baxi comes to his rescue here. Rawls’ assumption of original position seems to be true to the extent of allotment of freedoms to all. However, when it comes to exercise of these freedoms in the modern world, not everybody starts from a similar position. For instance, what does freedom to become an engineer mean for a twelve year old child who washes plates at a dingy eat-out. Upendra Baxi thus says that the capacity to exercise these rights or freedoms is as important as the freedoms themselves. It is here that the role of those who enjoy a position of inequality comes in. So the Education Minister’s position of inequality would be justified only when he builds enough capacity in the child so as to enable him to become an engineer. Unfortunately, the politicians of this country have made ‘capacity building’ and ‘reservation in higher education’ synonymous. What use is reservation in an engineering college for a person who has never visited a school? For such children the freedom or right to be educated is nothing but a tantalizing illusion.


Although, it is a fundamental right guaranteed to every child in this country to be educated at state cost till he attains the age of fourteen, it hardly solves the problem of capacity building. Unless this child completes his higher secondary education, his chances of succeeding in this competitive world are negligible. There is a hell lot of difference between being a literate and being educated. Another irony is that while most of the higher education professional institutions impart education in English, the state run schools impart education in regional languages making it even more difficult for the disadvantaged to succeed. I do not say that people coming from non-English speaking backgrounds can’t succeed at the professional institutions, but still it does have an affect today.

Mahatma Gandhi, a private individual enjoyed a position of inequality too. However, he used it to improve the life of his fellow human beings. I don’t want to sound too idealistic here but what least one can do ensure his contribution to the least advantaged is do his own job honestly and responsibly. The benefits would trickle down to the least advantaged. On paper, our system isn’t all that bad. It only fails when it comes to implementation. Today, accumulation of wealth has become the highest moral value for people. Man’s every action revolves around making money. It is not wrong to earn money for one’s hard work, but it should not be at the cost of the society one is part of.

What was true for the minister who was shot at in Rang de Basanti is true for each of us. Is our position of inequality for the benefit of the least advantaged? If it is not, this country would go no where. For, until a significant population of the country continues going to sleep without any food in their stomach, the booming economy is a mere facade and Indian names in the Forbes list of the richest, a travesty.

We don’t need a revolution to solve our problems. We need no people of the "third kind." We just need such people to take up positions of inequality who would do there jobs with honesty and responsibility and not just for the sake of power that comes with it. So, it is not our system that fails the people. It is the people who fail it. We need to have rule of law, i.e., governance according to the system and not according to men. Politics can't be allowed to prevail over law. It's is high time we stop blaming the system.


P.S.- I got busy searching for sponsors after having qualified for the World Finals of the Moot. The end-sems got over on the 14th. Our tickets and visas are ready. We’ll start practicing in a day or two…flying in the early hours of 25th. Godwilling, we’ll win something and come.

The moment of truth has come!

Yes, I did land safely...two months back though...

Much water has flown down the Ganges since I last posted...

Where should I start?

I got busy preparing for my mid-sems after coming back...then me, Adarsh and Roy practised day in and day out for our oral rounds of the moot...a day before we were to leave for Delhi, the International Organising Committee announced the cancellation of the sub-continental rounds...6 months of hard work seemed like going up in smoke...then came the projects submission deadline...that happened to be today...so here I am, back to the blogsphere.

And about that moot, we are expecting some announcement on the 15th of March...We are competing against all the major law schools...Godwilling, we'll go to Geneva.