27 ,January 2020
Common Law Admission Test (CLAT) is a national level entrance examination taken by law aspirants in the country. CLAT is conducted, on a rotational basis, by the 22 National Law Schools/Universities, as per the establishment seniority order. The exam is conducted on an annual basis and is the most important entrance level test for students willing to secure admissions to top NLUs and Law Schools in the country for undergraduate and postgraduate degree courses in law.
Every year, The Consortium of National Law Universities releases the syllabus for CLAT examination to be held concurrently. The Consortium also releases the Law Entrance exam date and initiates the application process online, after making live the official website for CLAT. Established on 19th August, 2017, The Consortium of National Law Universities envisioned raising the benchmark of legal education by having a streamlined approach towards conducting all India law entrance examination. It has its headquarters in NLSIU, Bangalore.
In addition to the coveted NLUs, CLAT score is accepted by a wide range of other prestigious and top ranking private colleges like ICFAI University, Lloyd Law College, Greater Noida, Symbiosis Law School, Noida, UPES, Dehradun, Amity University, etc. Many private colleges also conduct their own entrance exams like Lloyd Entrance Test (LET), conducted by Lloyd Law College, SET Law, by Symbiosis Law School, Noida, etc.
This year CLAT 2020 is being conducted by the National University of Study and Research in Law, Ranchi. All the necessary information regarding CLAT 2020 has been officially made available in the public domain by The Consortium on its authorized website (https://consortiumofnlus.ac.in/clat-2020/). As mentioned on the site,
the schedule for CLAT 2020 is as follows:
In order to be able to appear in CLAT 2020 examination, the candidates must have the following set of pre-requisite educational qualifications:
AGE LIMIT : There is no upper age limit mentioned or prescribed for candidates appearing for CLAT 2020. The students who will be appearing for class 12th board examinations in the months of March/April 2020 would also be eligible to take this exam. The only condition is their ability to produce the result of their board examination post qualifying the exam; at the time of admission. Any failure to comply with the same would amount to rejection of their candidature and consequent cancellation of their admission.
Educational Qualification: Applicant is required to have an LLB or equivalent degree from a recognized university with the following minimum percentage:
AGE LIMIT : No upper cap is imposed on the age limit for the candidates. Candidates sitting for qualifying examinations in the months of April/May 2020 are also eligible to apply.
The application form for CLAT 2020 for candidates interested in applying for the undergraduate law courses is available on the website of The Consortium. The applicants are required to create a login account to be able to access the application form. In addition to this, all the candidates with a registered account, and who have initiated application procedure, will also have access to the first sample paper of CLAT 2020 available on the website.
Following are the steps to fill up CLAT 2020 application form:
The CLAT 2020 application form consists of Personal details, Communication details, Academic qualification details, Course selection, Category Details and Exam Centre as well the NLU preferences. After filling in all the details and cross checking for their authenticity, click on the ‘Submit’ button.
You further need to upload the following documents:
Application fee can be paid via debit card/ credit card/ net banking or by generating a bank challan in the offline mode. The application fee is non-refundable. The registration fee is as follows:
To be able to access the past year CLAT paper, you need to pay an amount of Rs 500, over and above the application fee. Post the successful completion of all the aforementioned steps, you will receive a confirmation email/ SMS, acknowledging the receipt of your application form.
As per the press release on The Consortium website, the pattern of the question paper and the syllabus for the exam shall bear in mind the average competence of class 12th level students sitting for the exam. CLAT 2020 will be conducted in offline mode where the candidates will have to answer a set of 150 multiple choice questions in 120 minutes. The questions would cover the following subject areas:
For BALL.B Program:
For LLB Program:
CLAT 2020 question paper will consist of 150 MCQ type questions instead of 200 for BALL.B courses and 100 MCQs (1 mark each) and two subjective) questions (25 marks each) for the post graduate (LL.M) courses. Each question will carry 1 mark and a negative making of -0.25 will be done against every wrong answer. UG paper will not include any subjective questions. For PG applicants, a mixed pattern of MCQ and subjective questions will be there, as per the aforementioned information. For evaluation purpose of PG candidates, as specified in the press release, those securing 40% (35% in case of SC, ST & PWD) marks in the objective type test will only be eligible for assessment of descriptive answers.
Author
Ms.
Sakshi Dhaulta
Assistant Professor