The NLUO Mediation Cell at the National Law University Odisha was successfully inaugurated by Hon’ble Dr. Justice S. Muralidhar, Chancellor, NLUO & Chief Justice, High Court of Orissa on 15^th August 2022 in the presence of Prof. Ved Kumari, Vice Chancellor, NLUO and Prof. (Dr.) Yogesh Pratap Singh, Registrar, NLUO. The event witnessed huge participation by the local masses including some CMC Corporators of the nearby wards amongst others. Justice Muralidhar unveiled the foundation stone of the newly established Mediation Cell and ushered in a new beginning of institutionally-run Alternative Dispute Resolution forum in India.

The inauguration was followed by a multilingual presentation by the members of the Centre for Mediation and Negotiation (CMN), NLUO wherein they emphasized about the importance of the centre, the vision and goal with which it is set up and the Mediation Cell. Apart from this, the presentation also included the initiatives that have already been undertaken by the Centre as a part of its social activism.

After the presentation, Justice Muralidhar inspected the mediation room which was already equipped with all the resources to formally commence with the mediation sessions. He lauded the student members for having organized the room in a professional yet welcoming way. The student volunteers from the first year of the University had also prepared a skit on, “Mediation: An Alternate Dispute Resolution Mechanism” to spread awareness about the same amongst the local masses and they performed the same. Multilingual handouts containing information about the Centre and the Cell were distributed amongst the attendees. Justice Muralidhar commended the student members, volunteers and faculty advisers of the Centre for having undertaken this initiative which paves the way for Mediation and Negotiation as other feasible methods of dispute resolution amongst the masses.

The NLUO Mediation Cell is the first institutional-run mediation cell in India to provide live mediation services (both private and court-referred mediation). With this initiative, NLUO is striving hard to achieve the constitutional goal of access to justice and free legal aid. NLUO, with the establishment of NLUO Mediation Cell, is also not far from achieving the SDG 16 under UN Sustainable Development Goals 2030, i.e., Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions.

The NLUO Mediation Cell would be handling multifarious legal disputes including family, matrimonial, property, land and consumer disputes through mediation with the help of faculties-cum-trained mediators, and is looking forward to collaborate with other centres at NLUO and other organizations around. CMN acknowledges the efforts of the Legal Aid Society and the Pro-Bono Club for organizing CMN’s first joint outreach drive to create awareness about the resolution of disputes through mediation amongst the masses.

At the beginning, the Cell will focus on people from nearby places and will gradually extend to the whole state and provide free mediation services both physically and virtually through Online Dispute Resolution (ODR).

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On the 8^th of August 2022, the Centre for Public Policy, Law and Good Governance of NLUO, in collaboration with CivicDataLab, organised a session on Research Data Management. CivicDataLab is an organisation working with the objective of using data, tech, design and social science to strengthen the course of civic engagements in India.

The session was attended by students and faculty associated with different research centres of the University, with the objective of better equipping these Centres to excel in their areas of research. The session was conducted by Mr Apoorv and Mr Gaurav of the CivicDataLab. The resource persons introduced the participants to various problems with regard to organisation and analysis of raw information in tabular form. They shared various nuggets of techniques which will help in better analysis of data collected and drawing meaningful inferences from the same. They explained the ideas by solving various sample problems.

The session was interactive, with the participants being given the opportunity to solve the sample problems themselves before being introduced with smarter techniques of solving the problems. Valuable insights on the doctrinal aspects of the problems were given by the faculty members present in the workshop making the same more interdisciplinary.

On the 8^th of August 2022, the Centre for Public Policy, Law and Good Governance of NLUO, in collaboration with CivicDataLab, organised a capacity building session on online data collection and research using already available datasets.

CivicDataLab is an organisation working with the objective of using data, tech, design and social science to strengthen the course of civic engagements in India. Mr Apoorv and Mr Gaurav of the CivicDataLab were present in the session to share their valuable insights on the area with the faculty members and students present there.

The session was open to the students of the University, with special emphasis to students enrolled in the Child Rights (Seminar Course) and other students associated with various Centres of the University, keeping in the mind the need and?mportance?f data-based research in the field.

The session was attended by the Prof Ved Kumari, Hon’ble Vice Chancellor of the University and esteemed faculty members who shared their views on data-based research in India and its future potential in legal policy. Prof Ved termed the session as the ‘perfect starting point’ in the run up to the 9th Conference of the International Society for Child Indicators, which is going to be held in the University in February 2024. She emphasized on the significance of the event for future research that the students and alumni are going to perform in the area of child rights.

National Law University Odisha signed an MoU with CivicDataLab on 8^th August 2022 intending to facilitate data-based research at the University. The MoU will be facilitated and implemented by the Centre for Public Policy, Law and Good Governnance. As a part of this partnership, the Centre will be supporting CivicDataLab in offering tech literacy and capacity-building opportunities to the faculty and students at NLUO, and in reciprocation, the University aims to extend its expertise in the area of legal research and data analysis. By offering the research and data management support to its faculty and students, the Centre aspires at generating valuable research output for the legal fraternity.

In furtherance of the aim of this partnership, the Centre for Public Policy, Law and Good Governance organised two capacity-building sessions for students and faculty from different research centres on 8^th August 2022. The first session was on ‘Research Data Management’ focusing on the use of tools like excel and google spreadsheet to make data management easier, cleaner and time-saving. The second session was on ‘Online Data Collection’ to acquaint students and faculty of law with locating and using the already available data sets for research.

[CivicDataLab is an organization functioning with the objective of using data, tech design and social sciences to strengthen the discourse of civil engagement in India.]

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On August 4^th 2022, the Centre for Disability Law and Advocacy organised an interactive session with Senior Advocate Pankaj Sinha. The session was open to all the students and faculty of the University. The session was held in an informal manner where the attendees got to interact with the speaker and express their opinions, views and raise questions regarding the issues discussed.

After the introduction of the speaker, our Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Ved Kumari, started off the event by sharing incidents with respect to students with disability in the campus and then invited the speaker to begin the session.

The speaker, Mr Pankaj Sinha, is a Senior Advocate at the Supreme Court of India. He has many such cases to his name that have made many facilities accessible to persons with disabilities.

During the session, Mr. Pankaj Sinha had touched upon many issues concerning persons with disabilities. There were discussions about preconceived notions with regard to how any person with a disability is always seen as being dependent. A thought provoking point was raised at this juncture as to how every human being, disabled or otherwise, is always dependent on someone or something. No person is ever entirely self-dependent. The question made all the attendees think of their own biases and set forth the attitude of the attendees for the rest of the session.

Then the speaker discussed the history of legislation regarding the Rights of Persons with Disabilities dating back to earlier legislations. During this, there was a reference to the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities that had categorised persons with disabilities as a category of diversity instead of categorising them as a vulnerable group. Sir also drew parallels between the treatment of women in society earlier and the treatment of persons with disabilities now and discussed how women were not allowed to give evidence in court. Undermining of the abilities of certain groups of people has always been there, it is the society’s process to move away from it.

Then the speaker discussed the barriers faced by people with disabilities by giving examples from everyday society and also his personal life. The main barrier he talked about are the attitudinal barriers, social barriers, communication barriers and political barriers. Most people presume things for the persons with disabilities. They are not even addressed directly. The questions are always put to any person without disability accompanying them. This kind of behaviour sets in a huge barrier which is most commonly seen.

The attendees were then asked if any sign-language interpreters are present in any public place like an airport etc. When the answer was negative, the speaker remarked that it is the environment and the surroundings that disable a person. To draw a parallel, Sir discussed how students from reserved category are assumed to be less competent when in reality they had far fewer resources than anyone else. Therefore, clarifying how the surroundings make one disabled.

Before concluding, Sir went on to discuss two of his prominent cases, the Driving licence for the visually impaired case came about when the speaker was working with HRLN and it was a case that was earlier dismissed by the Supreme Court. Sir mentioned about his research that how a person with hearing impairment can travel to a foreign city, receive a driving licence there and that licence will be valid in India but the same person will not be given a licence if he/she stayed in India itself and applied for licence. It was also pointed out that the Delhi Police Advisory provided for persons with hearing impairments driving with the use of extra mirrors, etc. to ensure the ability.

Then Sir briefly discussed the Concessional railway e-ticket booking case, which basically arose because of the concession for travellers with disabilities being available only for in-counter booking and not online. Sir also addressed several questions raised by the attendees.

The entire session was extremely motivational and definitely a learning step for most of the attendees. The speaker challenged the attendees’ biases and perception towards how we treat a person with disabilities.

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The Centre for Research and Management of Natural Resources (CRAMON) organised a photography competition?or all students to observe the World Environment Day 2022. The theme of the contest was?reen Lenses: One Earth, One Picture. The submissions made by the following students have been selected as the top 3 entries in the contest and they will be receiving a cash?rize of Rs.1,500 each:

1. Mansi Gupta,?span style=”font-family: arial, sans-serif;”>Dharmashastra National Law University, Jabalpur
2. Anwesh Khemundu, National Law University, Odisha?br />3. Radhika Lohia, Saint Joseph’s School. Bhagalpur

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