When entering Army Institute of Law, Mohali in the first year, every student is exhilarated and thrilled for this one upcoming event ‘Novices Moot Court Competition’. We were too, me, my teammates, and my whole batch of 2028. Everyone was eager to read the proposition, make out relevant points from the plaintiff and defendant’s sides and basically just live their much-awaited Harvey Specter life for a few days. After reading the moot proposition, some started defending Thakurji and some framed Thakurji as a wealthy beast in their minds. Our moot proposition was primarily based on Tortious law on the ‘Act of God’ and ‘Negligence’ concepts. The suit was filed before the Civil Court of Ambala.
One week prior to D-day, we started working on our memorials. At first, we didn’t know how to hunt relevant case laws. We fished around the library, search engines and what not! Luckily we got some. Making memorials and working on our prop was tiresome yet boisterous is some ways. Funnily enough, one night, the whole Abhimanyu Hall was filled with first-years making memorials. This experience made us realize how much research and studying about the case, lawyers need to do before presenting it in court. Our whole batch worked very hard, even sacrificing a few hours of their sleep.
The Novices Moot Court Competition, 2023 was a rip–roaring, challenging event organized by the Moot Court Society, lasting for 4 consecutive days from the 28th to the 31st of August 2023. The theme for this year was “Harnessing Justice: A Gateway To Advocacy.” 28th August was the day of the Researcher’s test to examine the knowledge of the teams’ researchers. 29th August was the day for Preliminary rounds 1 and 2. There was a startling competition between 32 teams from which only 8 were to qualify for the quarter-final round. The air was jittery for all of us. The quarter-final and semi-final rounds were held on 30th August. The two teams that qualified for the final round were TC-02 and TC-06.
The final round was judged by the highly proficient and knowledgeable advocate, Mr. Paul Singh Saini, a very notable practicing lawyer at the Punjab and Haryana High Court since 1985. Secondly, we also had amongst us, Mr. Amar Vivek Aggarwal, a humble recipient of the National Youth Award for social work in villages with an experience of 31 years in advocacy, and thirdly our notable alumna, Dr. Vibhuti Jaswal.
After an Intriguing finale, TC-02, comprising of Saumya Dubey and Alankrita was adjudged as the winners! They were awarded the rolling ‘Novices Moot Court trophy’ and a cash prize of Rs. 4000. TC- 06, comprising Jasmine Yadav, Aradhya Sharma, and Ambika Rana emerged as the runners-up and were awarded with a certificate of merit each, and a cash prize of Rs. 3000 . Saumya Dubey was also adjudged as the ‘Best Speaker’ and was awarded a certificate and a cash prize of Rs. 1500 and Amishi Shukla was declared as the ‘Second Best Speaker’ and was awarded a certificate and a cash prize of Rs. 1000. Tanashvi Bhardwaj was awarded a certificate and cash prize of Rs. 1000 and was declared as the ‘Best Researcher’, the one writing this article.
The whole event was very alluring and compelling with a grand success. As first years, we learned so much from this experience and it will certainly help us in our future endeavours. I want to express my gratitude to the management for organizing this event and opening our doors to mooting. Last but not the least, MOOTING IS AN ART!
This article was written by Tanashvi Bhardwaj (1st Year).
