The Roundtable on Dharmashastra and Bharatiya Jurisprudence

22nd November 2024

The Roundtable on Dharmashastra and Bharatiya Jurisprudence was organized on 22nd November 2024 at Boardroom, 1st floor, Chanakya University, Global Campus, Bengaluru. It was a collaborative event between Center for Indian Knowledge Systems (CIKS) and School of Law, Governance and Public Policy (SGLPP). Dr. Naveen Bhat from CIKS and Prof. Chetan Singai from SGLPP headed the event. The intention of the roundtable conference event was to explore the possibility of introducing Bhāratīya perspective into contemporary legal education and accordingly identify the research areas for the same. There were 12 scholars invited from Legal and Śāstric background and the discussion mainly focused on bridging the gap between current legal education and Dharmaśāstra and Nyāyaśāstra, the traditional śāstras that can potentially induce the Bhāratīya approach in legal education and pedagogy. In the welcome address, Dr. M. P. Kumar, Pro-chancellor of Chanakya University and Prof. Yashavantha Dongre, Vice-chancellor of Chanakya University spoke on the need of the hour to Indianize the legal system and come out of the colonial mindset by having an indic way of looking at the concepts of Law and legal education. Prof. Dongre also highlighted the vision of Chanakya University which aims to bring in the Indic perspectives in education.Later, Padmashri Chamu Krishna Shastry delivered the keynote address highlighting the significance of the event and the need for such collaborative efforts to bring in Bhāratīya approach in contemporary legal education. He hoped that by the end of the discussion, people to work for the said project will be identified and the areas that need work will be pin pointed. Prof. Chetan Singai set the context for the discussion by enumerating the points discussed in the earlier roundtable that School of Law, Governance and Public Policy conducted in January 2024 on similar theme. The session was moderated by Dr. Naveen Bhat, where the scholars provided their insightful inputs by discussing the key questions enumerated in the Concept Note. Based on the inputs put forward by the scholars, they were divided into two groups that discussed the themes “Contextualizing Dharmashastra and putting in practice” and “Classroom experience and pedagogy” respectively to identify the sub-themes and areas of research to develop a pedagogy that can integrate the Bhāratīya śāstras in legal education.

The event concluded with a vote of Thanks delivered by Dr. Naveen Bhat on behalf of CIKS and SGLPP and by handing over a memento to each of the scholars who attended the event as a token of appreciation.