While engineering courses and medical sciences continue to hog the fancy of students in India, law has silently crept in as a strong third option for a professional career. Over the past two decades, the National Law Schools have sought to bring in a qualitative change in legal education and while their number is limited, they have spawned many private law schools, hence increasing supply.
In undertaking market analysis, a definition of the relevant product and geographic market is important. What do students consider as substitutes? A wider market definition would incorporate all professional courses as students are likely to keep preferences ranked in accordance with what would give them the most satisfaction. The ranking of preferences in this manner is an inevitable outcome of the fact that the outcomes are probabilistic. NEET and JEE exams offer a probability of 0.2 for the general category students which means that a vast majority have to keep their preferences open. Post ranking their preferences, an understanding of constraints- cognitive capacity, affordability, and others will have to be considered to arrive at a final choice that will decide which entrance exams to prepare for. The final list may consist of courses that bear little relationship by means of the skills required. An interpretation of this nature would keep the market definition wide, but an inevitable outcome of supply-side constraints. A narrower definition would, however, include only NLU's and competing private law schools. A good way to define this market would be to survey a sample student set to uncover the various entrance exams they chose to prepare for.The Geographic market could be restricted to India. Although there is a small percentage that choose to do their postgraduate studies outside, these numbers are much lower for undergraduate LLB courses. Given that the price is much higher and the content of the course also varies from what is prescribed by the Bar Council of India (BCI),which is a factor if one wants to practice in India, we can safely exclude other countries from the geographic market definition. Of course, some do complete their undergraduation in UK and qualify for practicing in India by virtue of a 'bridge course', approved by the BCI, but then this is at an additional cost.
The below table provides data related to NLU's (disclaimer - the author is not responsible for any inaccuracies that may have crept in and the fees are a conservative, lower level, indication and may not be related to any particular institution). The data includes both LLB and LLM applicants.The number of aspirants has increased nearly seven-fold over the past fourteen years. Supply, however, has been more modest in its increase.
But naturally, a competitive SS-DD market analysis cannot be undertaken for this market. Some observations - historically NLSIU (Bengaluru) has attracted a vast majority of first preferences and continues to do so although to a reduced extent and CLAT ranks are used by some other private law schools for their own admissions. So how would the short-run SS be shaped? How would the long-run SS curve react? Is it based on the cost of education? Do we even have a supply curve? Further what factors explain the demand pattern? The sharp increase between 2018 and 2019 is particularly intriguing.
