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CLAT PG: Current Legal Affairs and Research Aptitude

CLAT PG · Work through your exam, one topic at a time.

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Current Legal Affairs and Research Aptitude

Current Legal Affairs rewards accurate, dated knowledge of statutory and constitutional change; Research Aptitude tests how legal knowledge is produced, sourced and cited.

Recent developments

  • New criminal codes: BNS, BNSS and BSA came into force on 1 July 2024, replacing the IPC, CrPC and Evidence Act.
  • Constitutional: In re Article 370 (December 2023); Association for Democratic Reforms v. Union of India (February 2024) striking down electoral bonds; State of Punjab v. Davinder Singh (August 2024) permitting sub-classification within Scheduled Castes; the 106th Amendment (33% women's reservation in the Lok Sabha and State assemblies, effective after census and delimitation); Supriyo v. Union of India (October 2023) on same-sex marriage; the AMU minority-status reference (November 2024).
  • Statutes: Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023; Telecommunications Act, 2023; Chief Election Commissioner and Other Election Commissioners Act, 2023; Mediation Act, 2023.

Research aptitude

  • Doctrinal vs empirical: doctrinal research analyses statutes and cases; empirical research uses surveys, interviews and observation, with sampling and hypothesis-testing.
  • Sources: primary (Constitution, statutes, regulations, reported judgments, treaties) and secondary (commentaries, journals, digests). Databases: SCC Online, Manupatra, Indian Kanoon, AIR; citation styles: Bluebook, OSCOLA, ILI.
  • Ethics: attribution, avoiding plagiarism, accurate quotation, and disclosure of funding or bias.

Worked example

A research question asks why undertrial prisoners remain in custody despite default bail. The design should define the population (undertrial prisoners in a district), choose a sample, collect data from court records and interviews, and read the BNSS provisions on default bail doctrinally. A purely doctrinal answer describes the law but cannot explain the practice; a mixed-methods design answers the why.

Traps

  • Citing IPC section numbers for post-July 2024 conduct.
  • Treating a news report as a primary source.
  • Confusing a newspaper summary of the holding with the ratio.