How a Navodaya Programme Is Sending Village Students to India's Top Law Schools

In Athsaini village in Uttar Pradesh's Hapur district, power cuts once left Anshita Rani sitting in the dark with a book she could not read. Her father bought her a rechargeable lamp. She still keeps it, though it barely works now.

Rani, 23, is in the final year of a five-year law course at National Law University, Jodhpur. Her path there ran through the National Law Scholars Programme (NLSP), an effort to bring students from places that rarely produce lawyers into the country's most competitive law schools.

Started in 2019 as a collaboration between Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti and its alumnus Anoop Maurya, NLSP is a fully funded two-year residential programme. It spots promising students at Navodaya schools, prepares them for CLAT and supports them through law school.

From outreach to campus

Every year, NLSP holds outreach sessions across the Navodaya network, reaching roughly 10,000 students, mostly from rural backgrounds. Selection across more than 600 Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya schools involves two written exams and an interview. The written papers test school coursework; the interview assesses aptitude, potential, background and inclination.

Only 30 students are accepted each year. Those who qualify move to a campus, currently in Hyderabad, where they attend the local JNV school by day and coaching classes in the evening. The two years combine schooling with mentoring and leadership workshops, and students are encouraged to organise debates, mock parliaments and discussions on subjects from geopolitics to gender studies.

Of the 150 scholars selected in the last seven years, 120 completed the residential programme and went on to law school. Of these, 84 are still pursuing law, including 54 at National Law Universities. Those who secure admission continue to receive financial assistance, including tuition fees that can run into several lakh rupees a year.

Why the founder calls CLAT 'anti-poor'

Maurya, 31, born in Bahraich and educated in the Navodaya system, says school changed his circumstances and his outlook. He is an active member of the Bharat Navodaya Abhiyan, the public service wing of the JNV alumni network.

He argues CLAT has become an "anti-poor exam". A candidate is expected to work through a 40-page paper in two hours, much of it built around lengthy English-language passages adapted from publications. For many students NLSP takes on, he says, that is a challenge long before the examination hall.

Direction, and opposition

For Vedant Ravindra Deshmukh, 21, from Maharashtra's Wardha, law was never a viable career. His father liked to say lawyers cannot even afford soap to wash their coats. Deshmukh took the NLSP entrance test by accident: avoiding a notebook inspection, he slipped into a classroom where the test was being held. He topped the exam across Navodaya schools in three states in 2023 and later joined Rashtrasant Tukadoji Maharaj Nagpur University, formerly Nagpur University, with NLSP's help. He credits the alumni network with building his confidence.

Vaishnavi RK, 17, from a lower-middle-class farming family in Palakkad, Kerala, knew there would be objections, so she told her family about the test only after clearing it. Her family screamed, neighbours advised against it and teachers were apprehensive. "It was me against the whole village," she says, adding that much of the argument centred on safety. The programme, she says, changed their mindset too. On campus, she says, she once froze while speaking in public; now she can speak.

A. Taruna, 17, from Ramdurga in Karnataka's Bellary district, a village with two buses a day, decided on law in Class 8. His father, a former lawyer who gave up practice after an injury, and his mother worried that five years of study was too long when the family needed an earner. Taruna says those who understand the system hold an advantage over those who do not, and that gap is what he wants to fill.

The next hurdle

For students such as Rani and Deshmukh, the programme was only the first step. Adjusting to law school has meant contending with classmates who have stronger English and wider networks. "I feel like I'm constantly trying to catch up," Rani says. Internships and jobs are the new concern, with applications going unanswered and calls ignored.

Deshmukh has had a taste of what lies ahead. Interning with a law firm last year, he worked on a matter involving a major airline. When a response arrived from a bigger firm, he says he sat looking at the letterhead for a while before he could read the rest. "I thought maybe I could work there someday."