Is CLAT not accessible to students with disabilities? Lawyers, students weigh in

The CLAT 2023 exam is scheduled to be held on December 18, 2022. Admit cards for the exam will be issued today
Image for representation purpose only | Pic: EdexLive
Image for representation purpose only | Pic: EdexLive

With the admit card for the Common Law Entrance Test (CLAT) 2023 scheduled to be released today, December 6, law students and lawyers point out that the test, which determines their entry into a top-ranked National Law Universities (NLUs) in the country, is not accessible to students with disabilities, and those who come from low-income backgrounds. Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud lamented that this current model of selection of students for NLUs, which involves cracking the CLAT, may not result in the selection of those with the “right ethos”.

He was speaking on Saturday, December 3 after inaugurating the first academic session of the India International University of Legal Education and Research (IIULER) in Goa, an initiative of the Bar Council of India Trust-PEARL FIRST (BCIT-PF). Entrance tests like the CLAT do not necessarily allow entry to all the deserving candidates, he added, PTI reported.

He also noted in 2020, at a valedictory address at an international summit on the theme Legal Professionals with Disabilities on the International Day for Persons with Disabilities 2020, ”The tests that serve as entry points to enter the legal profession, most notably the CLAT are set out in a way that does not account for the unique challenges faced by disabled test-takers and places them in a disadvantageous position vis-à-vis their able-bodied counterparts,” according to reports.

Exam format
Maitreya Shah, a blind lawyer, pointed out that the format of the exam is not disabled-friendly. "I took the exam in 2015. There are multiple sections with limited time given to answer. It is a competitive exam but according to guidelines, alternative questions are to be given to students who are blind or require visual inputs. This was not done when I wrote the exam," he said. He studied at the Gujarat National Law University (GNLU).

As per details available on the website of the Consortium of NLUs, for UG students, the exam will consist of 150 questions divided into five sections. They will be given two hours for the exam. "There is no textual description for image-based questions. Additionally, it is tough to get scribes for the exam. The Consortium doesn't go out of its way to provide us with scribes. We have to find them on our own," said Anchal Bhateja, a fifth-year law student from the National Law School of India University (NLSIU), Bengaluru. She was the first 100 per cent visually impaired law student at the university.

The Consortium maintains that "Persons with a benchmark disability (not less than 40 per cent) are entitled to extra time (compensatory time) of 40 minutes for the two-hour CLAT 2023," as per a circular dated November 24, 2022. The same process has been followed for the last few years. However, lawyers say that this is not enough. "It is not easy to read and complete the paper in that much time. Additionally, it is a traumatic experience for students to find scribes by themselves," said M Karpagam, a visually impaired lawyer at Madras High Court.

She pointed to a case in the Supreme Court wherein a student with a disability was denied a scribe on account that he did not meet the criteria of the disability. The plea was filed last year by a UPSC civil service aspirant, having the neurological disorder 'dysgraphia' also known as a Writer's Cramp, who was denied the facility of a scribe in the exam on the ground that it can be provided only persons with benchmark disabilities such as blind candidates and those with a locomotor disability or cerebral palsy with an impairment of at least 40 per cent, PTI reported.  Writing the judgement, Justice Chandrachud held the facility of a scribe can be provided to persons with disabilities other than those having benchmark disabilities as given under the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act.

Accessibility on campus
In addition to the exam, students point out that facilities on their university campus are not disabled-friendly. NLSIU doesn't have an Office of Disability Services (ODS) which serves as a one-stop communication channel between the university and students with disability, Anchal said. "No disability audit of the campus's infrastructure has been conducted at least in the last five years. We have been pushing it for years but the progress has been very slow," the student added. Additionally, she recalled how the staff hasn't learnt how to teach students with disabilities. "The professor who teaches Economics did not know how to navigate graphs with me. After me, a lot of other visually-impaired students have joined but he still doesn't know how to teach accordingly," she said.

The Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act 2016 states that educational institutes should “provide reasonable accommodation according to the individual’s requirements and provide the necessary support, individualised or otherwise, in environments that maximise academic and social development consistent with the goal of full inclusion.” However, a 2019 report by an NGO named Samarthyam found that schools in Hyderabad didn’t have accessible toilets and entrances, information and communication systems, accessible routes and drinking water facilities, and ramps. The study also found that infrastructure in schools was considered unsafe for children with disabilities due to a lack of awareness about access standards among construction personnel.

Karpagam rightly pointed out that at the outset, many students with disabilities are denied admission by mainstream schools as they do not have the necessary facilities. "On the other hand, in special schools as well, many positions for the post of special educator lie vacant. This means that the percentage of students joining such law institutes gets filtered due to these barriers," she added. Once they do reach that stage, access to materials for studying is limited. "I struggled a lot while reading voluminous law books. I had to convert/scan all the books, convert them to ebook format, zoom in and then read. It was a long and hard process as I was not used to software reading," she recalled.

What needs to be done?

Law students emphasised the need for representation on behalf of disabled students. "Someone from the PwD category must be on the Consortium. They need to be consulted on how question papers and the exam format can be made more accessible," Anchal said. She added that institutes need to conduct regular audits to determine the accessibility of facilities on campus. "Additionally, everyone, including staff, students and security guards should be sensitised on these matters," she said.

Karpagam also noted that the exam centres need to be accessible too. "It needs to be within the areas where the students reside. If possible, the institutes must arrange and pay for their travel," she said.

Official response

Faizan Mustafa, the President of NLUs Consortium said that extra time is being given to PwD candidates during the exam, as per the law, every year. "The executive committee also decided last year that we will not ask questions based on figures so that visually-impaired students do not face any challenge," he added. He also stated that universities are providing five per cent reservation for these students as mandated by The Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act 2016 "NLSIU also has a reputed centre for disability studies and has built an accessibility lab in the library with the necessary software," he said. However, a report by Bar and Bench showed that only nine out of 22 NLUs in the country follow the aforementioned reservation criteria.

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