Dr. Bhadresh Dalal has been working as the Principal of Sarvajanik College of Law, Surat, Gujarat since 2015. He has done M.Com, LLM and PhD as part of his education. He is also specialized in Criminal Law and has a wonderful experience of 8 years of work experience with SCL.

Sarvajanik College of Law

What are the key factors that keep you connected with the education sector?

Our country has a massive young population under the age of 25 and the educational sector in recent years has undergone a significant change from schools and colleges to higher education institutions. And there is no doubt in the fact that the world of education is as exciting as challenging it is. Also, I firmly believe that along with being an educator, we are also students for lifetime. Hence all these factors have together helped to stay connected with the education sector for so long.

Being the Principal of SCL, what is your philosophy of leadership? 

I strongly believe in leading by example. Therefore, I have always paid more attention while planning any regular work or special tasks and make sure all my teachers transparently participate in the decision making process, so that we can achieve institution goals together as a team. Also, this approach not only promotes a good working-learning atmosphere, but also allows me to make better decisions.

How do you strategize the key programs for the marketing and administration of your college?

In today's digital world, social media platforms have been key tools for an educational institution, while it designs its marketing strategies. Because, people of all ages, be it old or young ones are on social media. Hence, we also follow the same approach and make best use of social media and our college's website to reach out to potential students and connect with them. And these sites give them a perspective about how it would feel like studying here at the university. Apart from this, the goal of our institution is to transform today's students into tomorrow’s leaders, which is why we use today’s marketing strategies to attract students, make them aware, engage, and enroll in our college.

In your experience, what benefits can students gain from studying here in your college?

SCL being an institution that imparts legal education has structured its curriculum and education program in a manner which facilitates holistic development of its students. Also, to provide required practical exposure to clinical legal education and give insight into the legal world to students, we regularly organize visits to various legal functionaries, seminars and conferences on current and emerging trends.

How does the curriculum of SCL ensure the best practices of industry?

The curriculum of our institution is regularly revised, keeping in mind the demands for new skills and challenges facing law and legal education in the emerging global scenario. And once changes are updated, it is reviewed by the Board of Studies and approved by an expert panel of the Academic Council.

Also, the recent legal reform implies that today's college needs to produce such professionals whose ideas and work can bring necessary fundamental change in the legal system. It also calls for deepening and broadening the variety of knowledge and skills taught at the institution through an expanded range of electives. Hence, apart from regularly revising the curriculum of our institution in collaboration with industry experts and legal experts, we have adopted multiple unique approaches to teach students and it mainly includes practicals, field visits, experts speech, presentations, project works and interactive classes. We also send them for internships in reputed organizations to give them a real taste of outside world competition.

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How is your Institute more welcoming to students of different races or economic backgrounds?

According to me, one of the key ingredients in promoting cultural diversity and awareness in an institution is to make tolerance and inclusion a priority. Also, we have carefully implemented university-level policies that outline student and faculty conduct to strictly prohibit any kind of discriminatory and harassing behavior against anyone. Also, we regularly educate our students about our standards and clearly define to them what actions are and are not appropriate on college premises. 

What are your key roles and responsibilities towards the students as a Principal?

As a Principal of the SCL, I am mainly responsible to provide a vibrant learning environment to students and ensure their overall development, so when they graduate from our institution they are fully equipped to face the realities of life and at the same time are compassionate. Further, once a student graduates, he/she is still associated with our institution through the alumni association. 

What do you think should be the college’s top priority over the next 10 years?

Our goal for the next few years is to make this institution a centre for legal research and to contribute to the emerging fields in legal education. 

What is the vision of your Sarvajanik College of Law?

The Sarvajanik College of Law, which was established in 2015, is the youngest constituent college of Sarvajanik University. And from the time it was founded, it is committed to provide excellent educational opportunities to young and ambitious students of society, fulfill all their academic and non-academic needs and empower them to meet and exceed challenges as active participants in shaping the future of our country. We also endeavor to make our students the best in whatever constructive they do and polish them into professionals who would make a mark in the legal area.

What are some of the greatest strengths of your institute?

The greatest strength of our college is our well-trained, research-oriented, dedicated and energetic teaching staff and most of them have worked in the corporate field, have had litigation practice and then they joined academics. Hence their past and present experiences bring a great culmination of practicality with theoretical clarity in law. In addition to this, our non-teaching staff also contributes a lot to our strength and resilience.

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What biggest challenges do you see, both for higher education in general and for SCL specifically?

In my opinion, there are several key challenges which today's higher education institutions are facing nowadays and the very first problem which they need to fix is that they need to improve their overall education qualities as well as ways to impart it. Along with this, infrastructure of most of them is not updated in accordance with changing technologies and diverse learning needs of students, so they need to upgrade that.

Also, there is an urgent need to focus on the graduate students and provide them such courses in which they can achieve excellence, gain deeper knowledge of the subject and grab a good job. Last but not the least, if I talk about SCL, despite being a self-financed institution, the biggest challenge for us is the lack of basic infrastructure and requisite facilities. 

Any suggestions which you would like to give to the current youth and aspiring students?

I would like to advise all the aspirants out there to fully enjoy their law school journey, attend events happening in other cities, participate in national-level moot courts and visit other colleges. Because, these experiences are going to stay with you for a long time.

How faculty members of your college are contributing in enhancing the education quality of it?

The diverse and knowledgeable faculty is the pride of our institute and their prime endeavor is to improvise the course material. Hence keeping this in mind they have introduced new fields of law like intellectual property, environmental law, human rights education, gender sensitivity, uplifting women and poverty alleviation for the whole country.