The inception of the Student Advocate Journal was the result of the visionary ideas of the first batch of students of NLSIU. The Journal’s founding value — to create a “new era in legal education” — has continued on and guided the Editorial Boards for more than three decades. In 2002, the Student Advocate Journal was renamed as the ‘Student Bar Review’, and it continued to bear this label until 2008, when it was once again rechristened to take its present name — the ‘National Law School of India Review’.

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From 2007, in a bid to further accomplish its mandate to promote legal discourse in India, NLSIR began publishing two issues annually. Simultaneously, in the same year, it organised the first edition of the annual ‘NLSIR Symposium’. The NLSIR Symposium is the flagship event of the Student Advocate Committee, which seeks to provide a platform for discourse on topical legal issues. It provides an excellent opportunity to discuss recent developments in emerging areas of law and the theoretical and practical ramifications of ongoing legal controversies. The Symposium also serves as the foundation to our second issue each year, which is themed on the Symposium and commonly features articles from panelists.

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Over the years, the Journal has produced high-quality legal literature on critical issues, authored by eminent jurists, judges, legal practitioners and students. It holds the proud distinction of being cited thrice by the Supreme Court of India — first in Action Committee, Un-Aided Pvt. Schools v. Director of Education, Delhi, second in the landmark 2018 judgment of Justice K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India, which recognized the fundamental right to privacy, and most recently in Union of India v. Mohit Minerals, which provided an explanation towards the recommendations of the GST Council. NLSIR has also been cited in the Justice B.N. Srikrishna Committee report titled A Free and Fair Digital Economy: Protecting Privacy, Empowering Indians, which served as the foundation to the Draft Personal Data Protection Bill, 2019 and in the 21st Law Commission Report released in July 2018 which discussed the legal framework for gambling and betting in sports including cricket in India. Finally, NLSIR’s articles have been cited in numerous books, treatises and other academic writings over the years, most notably, in Justice R.S. Bachawat’s Law of Arbitration and Conciliation.

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In keeping with its aims to both contribute to pioneering legal scholarship, as well as promote accessibility to legal writing and discourse, the Journal launched ‘NLSIR Online’ in 2018. NLSIR Online is the online counterpart to NLSIR which is intended to serve as a forum for regular engagement with contemporary legal developments. NLSIR Online features crisp and contemporaneous pieces of shorter length, authored by reputed legal professionals and students of law from across the globe.