NLSIR ONLINE SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

In its 33rd year now, the NLSIR holds the distinction of being the first Indian student-run law journal to be cited by the Supreme Court of India, most recently in Justice K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India, which declared the right to privacy as a fundamental right under the Indian Constitution. NLSIR Online, the online forum of the Journal, seeks to provide incisive, accessible, and inclusive legal scholarship on issues at the forefront of contemporary legal discourse.

1. Area: The submission should deal with a relevant or topical issue concerning any contemporary legal developments, including recent judgments and legislative changes, with relevance to India. In addition to this, responses to articles published in the previous volumes of the NLSIR may also be published.
2. Originality:
   • Only original content developed by the author(s) will be accepted.
   • Authors must ensure that their chosen theme/arguments have not already been substantially covered in past articles. Such submissions will be rejected without review. However, this does not apply to responses/contrary opinions/different perspectives to existing content.
   • We shall host only those pieces, that have not been in circulation previously, either in print or online
3. Word Limit: The submission should be between 1500-3000 words. This stipulation is flexible at Editor’s discretion in exceptional cases.
4. Hyperlinks: References must be in the form of hyperlinks, linked to keywords and phrases in the body of the submission. Footnotes should only be used where necessary.
5. Declaration: The authors must also include a declaration as to the bonafides of their submission. A sample declaration to that effect can be: “I confirm this is my original work in entirety.” 
6. Acceptance: Submissions may be accepted/rejected based solely on the discretion of the Editorial Board. The Editorial Board will evaluate submissions on the basis of criteria including but not limited to originality, argumentation, language, structure and analysis. Purely descriptive pieces are discouraged. Editors shall compare submissions with existing literature available elsewhere to assess novelty. Furthermore, the Editorial Board reserves the right to reject a piece at any stage, if it is noticed that these criteria are not duly met.
7. Timelines:
   • The Editorial Board will take around 10-15 days to respond to submissions.
   • Please note that our editors will directly respond with the verdict to each submission, as per the stipulated timeline. Due to our volume of submissions, we do not follow the policy of sending formal acknowledgements of receipt.
   • In case of articles on very recent developments which may lose novelty or relevance within days, authors may request an expedited review by adding the words “Expedited” in the subject line. Such articles shall be reviewed within 3 days.  Such exception shall be granted solely on the discretion of the Editorial Board, otherwise, the submission will be relegated to the normal review cycle.
8. Submission Process:
   • Submissions must be emailed to mail.nlsir@gmail.com in the form of a word document. The subject of the email should be ‘Submission – NLSIR Online’.
   • The body of the email must contain succinct biographical information of the author(s) and the name of the institution that they are affiliated to. Submissions are welcomed from students, academicians and practitioners alike.
9. Deadline: We will be accepting submissions for the NLSIR Online on a rolling basis. Please write to us for any queries at nlsir@gmail.com.

Once posted on NLSIR, a submission may be cross-posted on other platforms. The cross-post must carry the words ‘First posted on National Law School of India Review’, with a link to the NLSIR post.