Interview with Mr. Anish Jaipuriar who bagged the Best Speaker Award in 9th G.H. Raisoni National Moot Court Competition

Live law: Congratulations, Mr. Anish Jaipuriar for the Best Speaker Award in 9th G.H. Raisoni National Moot Court Competition. How do you feel?

Anish: Thank You, Amazing!! As a super-enthusiastic mooter I always dreamt of winning the Best Speaker award, and now having won that, I could not be more thrilled. It is always nice to be rewarded for the hard work that you put.

Live Law: You are in your last semester of law school, why this moot?

Anish: Before I answer this question I have to thank my teammates Meril Mathew Joy and Mayank Sapra for making me do an Intellectual Property Law Moot. We are currently in the final semester of law school, so to do a moot in the first place was itself a big decision, as taking out the time for it was a real challenge. But we all knew we had to do one last moot before law school ended.

Now why this moot, well it was more of a spontaneous decision than anything else, still it worked out pretty well given that we had lost almost 8-10 days of preparation time since the release of the problem.

Live law: How was the moot problem? How was the experience?

Anish: The moot problem was extremely interesting. It was based on the highly celebrated decision in the Novartis case. It focused majorly on the constitutionality and application of the much talked provision in the patent regime of late i.e. 3(d) of Patents Act which prohibits ‘evergreening’. The moot problem was structured in a manner that for the preliminary rounds, the participants had to prepare separate memorials for appearance before Intellectual Property Appellate Board in 2008, while for Semi-Finals and Finals separate memorials had to be prepared with different drafting rules for appearance before Supreme Court in 2014. So preparing four memorials was a unique, challenging and needless to say a rigorous task given the time we had.

But the overall experience was extremely delightful, not only did I learn a lot in the subject area but we also participated in various extra-moot activities such as law-quiz, Personality quiz. Surprisingly, I stood second in the Mr. Personality contest.

Live law: How does a Moot court Competition helps a law student? Please share your Mooting Experience?

Anish: I feel Moot Courts are as much an integral part of law school as academics or internships etc. I have always asked every junior in my law school to atleast participate in one moot, just to gather experience and anything else.

Moot Courts do take you beyond the pages of books that you read as part of your curriculum. It definitely adds to your CV as well as helps you to think analytically and logically towards solving problems of the party you represent. Even though I have been told by a number of practicing advocates that real time practice in a court of law is quite different, I still feel that moot courts give you a good platform to practice and prepare oneself before going out in the real.

As for myself, I have participated in 3 national moots with awards in two of them and 1 international moot. I have been the Convener of ‘The Moot Society’ of National Law University Odisha, Cuttack for 3 years, and been a part of several organizing teams of moot court competitions in our University and yet I don’t think I have had enough of mooting for this lifetime. So far in life, this definitely is one of the very few things that I have pursued so passionately.

Live law: How far does a ‘team factor’ works in a moot court Competition?

Anish: Oh! That I believe is the most important factor. The compatibility of team members to overcome challenges together as well as  challenge each other intellectually so that the best possible solution is reached as and when the need arises. I truly believe I couldn’t have asked for a better team.

Live Law: Does speaking/oratory skills really matters or the research alone will suffice to get through the Moot?

Anish: Certainly, if you can’t convey your arguments to the judges in the oral rounds well, even the best memorial goes in vain since if the oral delivery is not good or well-rehearsed your chances of getting through the rounds become very petite. The manner in which you present your arguments, the demeanour with which you answer to questions is crucial to make an impression and win the rounds which mere research will not help you accomplish. The two aspects of mooting viz. research and orals go hand in hand and play an equally important role in winning.

So, in order to prepare, we practiced several times just to make ourselves comfortable with the facts and the law, at the end of it our aim was to argue without looking at the memorials. It was the joint effort of both research and orals that we also made it to the semi-finals.

Live Law: Please provide some TIPS to all the mooters out there.

Anish: Just work as a team and that hard work never go unnoticed.

Live law: Congratulation to you for getting a PPO in a Tier I Law Firm. Please share your feelings?

Anish: The news of winning the Best Mooter and news of getting a PPO happened simultaneously, so essentially the month of March turned out to be great. It is an incomparable relief to have secured a job even before you graduate, it just feels great.

Live Law: National Law University Odisha is performing extraordinarily well in moots. What do you think are the reasons for the growing culture at your university?

Anish: Yes, it is truly wonderful how far NLUO has come to be recognized among the top law schools when it comes to mooting. I feel the stable mooting policy of selection and allocation of moots has done wonders. Competitive rewards when it comes to attendance and reimbursements have also kept the motivation of our mooters extremely high. The new heights in mooting that NLUO is achieving is more close to us as we are the first batch and hence it’s heartening to see that from just best memorials, NLUO now also wins the best speaker, best researcher and best team as well. We have also made our mark in national rounds of Stetson and Jessup, and therefore I feel confident

 Well thank you so much. Mr. Anish. We wish you a great future ahead.

Shobhit Batta, Student Reporter, Live Law is a Student of National Law University, Odisha