How moot court competitions have done more harm than good

Ask any Lawyer about a Moot Court Competition (hereinafter referred to as 'MCC'), and you'll always see a reluctant acceptance of its benefit. The reluctance is mostly because most Lawyers haven't done it; because real Law in practice demands many skills apart from those apparently honed by MCCs; and because of the flawed ways how it is so conducted by colleges in India.

Out of the above-mentioned three reasons, I won't deal with the aspect of not having done a moot court competition: simply because it's not a pre requisite for being a good lawyer. There are better avenues for learning legal practice, best being an internship and simple exercises such as conversing more often in English.

In this Article, I shall deal with the following two aspects:

1. Many skills are needed for Practicing Law.
2. Flawed ways by which MCCs are conducted by Colleges in India.

Before proceeding further, I must tell you I have done various moot court competitions, been well appreciated as well, and have learnt a lot from it as well. Apart from practicing in India, I have also attended (just as a viewer though) court proceedings in Australia and Singapore. Thus, my Article is not borne from any personal bad experience, but from experience in Legal Education and Legal-Justice Field.

1. *Many Skills are needed*

Without stretching it like a novel, I'll straight away enumerate various skills which (in my opinion) are needed  to practice Law in India:

1. Intelligence, and ability to apply learnings from one case to twenty other dissimilar situations.
2. Hard work, and especially the ability to run in scorching heat (since India is a hot country for most parts).
3. Legal Acumen and interpretation of Statutes.
4. Research Skills.
5. Speaking confidently before a Judge.
6. Humility, and the understanding that if you get scolded in court because of your weak case or your client's conduct, it is not you who is actually receiving the scolding, but your client. 
7. Patience, Persistence, and the ability to wait, and not jump the ship, as also to survive the time from age 25-30 (the marriage bracket).
8. Being Shrewd and Cunning enough to not to be fooled by the Client, by the Court staff, or by opposing Lawyer.
9. Ability to strive alone, without any Group behaviour.
10. The understanding that Law is a Noble Profession; that half the remuneration in this field is money, and the rest is social welfare.
11. Being an effective communicator, and being proficient in English and Hindi at least.

These skills are not exhaustive, and anyone can add over it, but I think they suffice. All these skills are equally important, and unless you get all these skills, either you won't be successful, or won't be happy, or both. 

But in my opinion, the Moot Court Competitions as they are conducted, focus only on a few of these, and Lacs of Law Students enter into the field with a flawed experience and expectation that only these skills are required, and they think that because they excelled in MCCs, they will be successful Lawyers; then they see the reality, and receive such a big culture shock of their lives. The Law Students engross so much in niceties, and Legal Research, that their other skills are never brought to life. Let me tell you, while Moot Court Competitions are very good and do help you, there are much better avenues to develop skills of a practicing Lawyer:

1. Internships.
2. Just sitting and observing proceedings in a Court.
3. Volunteering in Socio-Legal organisations, Governmental or Private.
4. Doing simple exercises such as speaking in English amongst your friends and family, reading aloud newspapers, reading Wren and Martin, participating in healthy public debates.
5. Reading Case Laws.

I think a lot of undue and bloated flair and some imagined fairy land is subscribed to Moot Court Competitions, and I have seen many young Lawyers still living in the forgone dream of having been a champion mooter, and not doing so excellent in actual practice. I dont wish to take away the hard work put in by the mooters (even I cherish my hard work at that), but the thing is, that if any particular activity is overemphasized and other, and I argue more productive endeavors, are shadowed or neglected by it, then that activity becomes counter productive in a Law Student's life. To put it in simpler terms, if I was given an option today to choose between Moot, or doing the above listed things, I'll choose the latter and advise others to do the same. I also argue, that Law Schools in India are deficient in apparatus to arrange good internships, explain a student how to read and understand case laws and so forth, and hence try to compensate the voids by doing parades of Moot Court Competitions.

2. *The Flawed Ways how MCCs are conducted in Law Colleges in India*

1. India still suffers from slave mentality, and we get some sort of orgasm, when we hear the term "International". Such is the case with International Moots in India as well. I have seen students, who haven't been inside any court or Tribunal in India, fantasizing about International Law, being in Hague, and so forth.  While it is not my suggestion that International Law is in any way lesser, but the thing is, that unless you're one of the top 10 Advocates in India, which will definitely take more than 2 decades, there is no way in heaven that you'll ever be chosen to represent India or any country before ICJ.

But, I'm sure there are many other positions other than Legal Counsel, which you can get and do something in the field of International Law. But, in that case, I don't think you having done International Moots would help you much. What would help you more, and in fact would be a pre requisite, is to do LLM from an Ivy League college, and you must apply fully to get an admission there. I'm sure many people having some affinity towards International Law would disagree, but look at Mr. Harish Salve- how many International Moots did he do?

2. Moots in India focus too much on niceties to the brink of stupidity. Nobody, as a norm, for example, starts babbling "If it may please your Lordship, I, xyz, on behalf of....... and my co counsel would take 20 minutes". That Sir, is ridiculous, and if you do that in any court in India, you'll have the judge confused as to what the hell are you saying! Senior Advocates simply rush to the main desk, when their item number is called (that's what you call the case as they're called out serial number wise, not any dance number of bollywood), and just say "Please, your Lordship". That's all. In very few cases, like 1/100, at final arguments' stage, the Judge pressurizes the Advocates to restrict themselves to a timeline, and even that's not rigid. Again, I think, this whole plethora of rote lines, without any context, is not so productive, and I have actually seen that participants fail to recite this poem of niceties, and then lose confidence and hence train of thought to argue their case.

3. The writers of moot problems, or I'm sure they'll like to call themselves 'Artists', create such a moot problem, which scintillates THEIR minds, not the participants. A mistake that many film directors also make, is that they just focus too much on making THEIR dream movie, and focus too little on what the audience (in this case, the Participants) needs, that the end product ends up as a disaster. I also once read about a Moot involving Harry Potter characters. Seriously! Why? What purpose would that solve? One needs to to constantly remind oneself, that the end of the day, it is for a Law Student, for him to be prepared for Real World, not some imaginative land which creates passion in the heart of a writer.

4. The 'Judges' who preside over a court in a Moot, more often than not, ask questions or engage with a Participant, just to bully him, or to show off his knowledge, and not prepare him for the 'real life tough judges'. In my experience, Judges are not such bullies, as are Moot Court Judges. Judges of Moots harass and bully Law Students, and then later tell, that Real Life Judges are Tougher. That's a Lie. MCC Judges do such things like- 'Refer to me as Shahrukh Khan, and my brother Judge as Sachin Tendulkar'. No judge does that. If the other aspects of MCC were not ridiculous enough, such Bully judges make it up for that. 

It may be the case that I am being over critical of the MCCs in India, but if you are a Law Student, who has done more than 3 MCCs, I say to you, you're wasting your time. To win a MCC should not be your dream. It's not worth it. If you're a Senior/Alumni/Lawyer who is called to judge a Moot Court, don't harass or bully a Participant, but fill him up with confidence, and in fact be lenient. That would help him more. I hope the stakeholders, and students of Law take this Article in correct spirit, and re evaluate the purposes of a Moot Court Competition. 

A Law Students' time is very limited, and if adequate skills are not acquired in time, it may even be disastrous for one's career. Careers are made or damaged, within first few years of a Lawyer's career, and we need to ask ourselves, is the Moot Court Competition best way to acquire those skills?