On why law graduates should consider law as an optional.

Over the course of my preparations, I have come across the notion that most law graduates prefer not to take up law as their first optional, let alone an optional for the mains. Further, queries from various law graduates like whether law was a scoring optional, has finally given my some food for thought, as a result of which here is my first blog post.

I had taken law as my first optional for the prelims and as an optional for the mains. Even I had a fair share of my doubts before taking law but they were quickly dispelled after I spoke to my seniors who had taken law and qualified with good ranks. There are good reasons on why law graduates should take up law, and I would like to clarify some of the issues regarding the same and the reasons why I took law.

Foundation and Conceptual Clarity: The most important reason to take law is because you have studied law in your graduation. No matter how badly you may have done or how well, the important point to remember is that you have a foundation in law and at least some sort of conceptual understanding for most of the topics. This is a very important aspect many students ignore while choosing some other subject, because the next question is: if not law what else? Is there a better alternative? For me, I could not think of any other subject other than law because I felt that the five year B.A. LL.B. (Hons.) course, provided me a good foundation in law. Even though I enjoyed humanities subjects like sociology or history, I felt that I was stronger placed in law compared to these subjects, on the basis of which I could decide on law an optional. Hence a lot of time may be wasted in trying to understand the basics of a new subject, which could have been better utilised in revisiting law and studying it from the civil service exams perspective (as opposed to trying to build a foundation in a new subject). I prepared law on my own and did not take up coaching. I only enrolled for a law test series for the mains.

Further, for the Prelims, the law syllabus is well defined and not very vast. There are six topics and only jurisprudence is not common to the mains syllabus. Hence, it made sense to take law because it is scoring and most of the topics covered in the prelims would also be covered in the mains.

There is a misconception that law is not scoring. There are many who make it to the merit list with law as an optional. It is true that law is not a popular optional say unlike geography or public administration. But this is because only law graduates would choose law. Thus the low numbers of persons taking law should not lead to the conclusion that is not very popular, and hence not scoring. Many who are pursuing a three year LL.B. degree in law after their graduation may also opt for another subject or their subject of graduation, which may explain why many law graduates do not take law. However, the success rate of persons with law over the last few years would suggest that law has as good, if not better success rate compared to other subjects. The latest annual report of the UPSC for 2008-09 publisehd on the website shows that law has a success rate of 5%. This is good considering the fact that most subjects which had around 200-300 students appearing for that subject in the mains (law had 280 persons in 2008), had a success rate of around 5-6%. Even most popular subjects like public administration and geography had a success rate of 8.4% and 6.9% respectively. Hence it is no more or no less scoring than any other optional, provided you work hard for it and follow the right strategy. Even though the exception proves the rule, one can take encouragement from the fact that one of the highest scores for law secured by a successful candidate has been 389, obtained as recently as in the 2008 mains exam.

Another reason many maybe dissuaded is that the syllabus for mains is vast. I would agree that the syllabus is vast but at the same time it is manageable. Also like I said before, one has to approach this issue in context of other subjects. Hence, when compared to studying a new subject, the vast syllabus of law would become manageable given the fact that more time may be spent in studying, analysing past year papers, making notes and learning, all with a view to cracking the exams. Further although it is advisable to cover all the topics equally well as the exam papers try and cover all portions of the syllabus, analysing past years papers, the syllabus and the way questions are divided section wise in both the papers, would suggest that a focussed approach makes the syllabus much more manageable.

Most people are dissuaded because of the number of cases and sections from bare acts that one has to remember. How does one remember so much? This is a problem faced by many. I faced this dilemma because five years can be a long time. I had forgotten many of the topics like constitutional law and contracts, which I had done in the first two years of law school. I was also overwhelmed by the fact that I had to memorize so many sections of the IPC or Contract Act, being so used to open book exams. The only way out is thorough study and constant revision, which is greatly enhanced if notes are prepared. While I agree that it is not easy to remember so much at one go, making notes and revising them, would over a period of time ensure that you have the important sections and case law at your fingertips.

I must admit that for most of the topics, especially constitutional law, I enjoyed learning again (in most cases learning for the first time!). As I started reading books like V.N. Shukla and the Constitution Bare Act, I realized that I missed a lot during law school. This discovery of the nuances of the constitution made me realize that it is very beautifully and meticulously written document which really makes sense. So, if you like law and like reading law, I would definitely recommend that you take law as an optional. While it is important to study law from the point of view of cracking the exam and scoring good marks, enjoying the process, would help sustain your interest and motivation, over a long period of time, which this exam demands.

So to summarize:
1. Take law because you already have a conceptual understanding and a foundation. This way you do not waste time figuring out a new subject, and spend your time more fruitfully towards cracking the law paper getting a good score. Since you have to take another optional subject anyway, you can balance your time accordingly and give more attention to learning one new subject, compared to two.
2. No matter what optional you choose, you have to work hard anyway, so you may as well work hard towards something that you enjoy reading (if not for all the topics in law at least a substantial amount of the syllabus).
3. The syllabus can be managed with a good strategy and careful analysis of past years question papers.

What are the other advantages of taking law?
1. Overlap between the Constitutional Law syllabus (Paper I) and the Polity portion of the General Studies Paper I. Even recently added topics on ‘Contemporary Legal Developments’ for Law Paper II, like Right to Information, Competition law and IPR are relevant and could be asked in the General Studies papers.
2. Even though one may choose different subjects, a law graduate may be asked questions on law during the time of the interview. So it makes sense to be in touch with all the legal provisions, especially constitutional law. I had read an interview of a candidate (a law graduate) who had not taken law as an optional but was asked many questions on law during the interview.