Call for Papers: 1st NLIU-CLT SAM Global Symposium on Law and Technology at NLIU Bhopal, with Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas [6 March 2027; Abstracts Extended to 28 September]

The Cell for Law and Technology (CLT) of the National Law Institute University (NLIU), Bhopal is organising the 1st NLIU-CLT Global Symposium on Law and Technology (NLIU-GSLT) in collaboration with Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas & Co. (SAM). The symposium will be held on 6 March 2027.

The symposium seeks to give academicians, practitioners, research scholars and students a structured platform to deliberate on contemporary legal and policy challenges in India's digital and technology ecosystem, a field governed by an evolving regulatory regime led primarily by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY). Practitioners and legal leaders from SAM will form the expert panel, and the technical sessions will feature discussions from SAM's team.

The call is for an in-person event: the brochure states that the further fee payable by selected presenters is inclusive of food and accommodation for the symposium.

NLIU Bhopal was established on 1 September 1998. Its Cell for Law and Technology was set up in October 2019 under the mentorship of its Faculty-in-Charge, Prof. (Dr.) Atul Kumar Pandey. The Cell runs the peer-reviewed NLIU Journal of Law and Technology (JLT), submits legislative comments on draft regulations, publishes a newsletter and hosts its annual flagship event, Techtonic.

Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas & Co. is a full-service Indian law firm that advises technology businesses and handles intellectual property matters; it is the collaborator for the symposium.

• Promote research and dialogue on contemporary technology law and governance.
• Critically examine recent regulatory frameworks, legislative acts and policy proposals governing emerging technologies.
• Analyse judicial trends, constitutional implications and regulatory adjudication on digital rights and cyber law.
• Encourage interdisciplinary engagement between law, public policy, ethics and digital economics.
• Provide a national forum for original research on technology regulation, artificial intelligence, data privacy and digital infrastructure.
• Facilitate interaction between academia and industry on practical legal and policy challenges in the digital ecosystem.

• Algorithmic Bias and Discrimination: Can Technology Be Constitutionally Neutral?
• Digital Surveillance and the Right to Privacy: Legal Limits on State and Private Monitoring
• Children in the Digital Age: Privacy, Online Safety and Platform Responsibility
• Technology and Access to Justice: Opportunities and Legal Challenges of Digital Courts and Legal Technology
• Cross-Border Data Transfers: Reconciling Data Sovereignty, Privacy and the Global Digital Economy
• Regulating Big Data: Ownership, Consent and Control Over Data-Driven Technologies
• Autonomous Systems, Human Consequences: Law in the Age of Self-Driving Tech (liability and safety regulation for autonomous vehicles and drones)

The symposium is open to undergraduate and postgraduate students, doctoral scholars, academicians and researchers, advocates and legal practitioners, professionals in law and technology, and policy makers. Participants may register individually or in teams of up to two authors.

• Long Articles (5,000-8,000 words): engage with the theme comprehensively and offer an innovative reassessment of the current understanding of it. Co-authorship of up to two authors is permitted.
• Short Articles (3,000-5,000 words): more concise papers dealing with a specific issue and arguing that it must be conceptualised differently, with an easily identifiable, concrete argument.
• Case Comments (1,500-2,500 words): analyses of a contemporary judicial pronouncement or a new piece of legislation, rules or consultation paper, in India or abroad. A case note must trace the line of cases behind the decision and comment on its implications; a legislative comment must analyse the objective and expected legal impact of the legislation.

Word limits exclude footnotes and may be relaxed by up to 10% at the Editorial Board's discretion.

• Submit an abstract of not more than 250 words that clearly states the research question, methodology and key arguments.
• Manuscripts: A4, MS Word, British English, Times New Roman 12 pt, 1.5 line spacing, justified, 1-inch margins; footnotes in 10 pt, single-spaced.
• Citation: OSCOLA or the Bluebook (20th edition).
• The manuscript must not identify the author(s); doing so leads to rejection. Work must be original and unpublished.
• Plagiarism leads to direct rejection; similarity must not exceed 15%.
• All manuscripts go through blind review. The Editorial Board may edit, modify or shorten manuscripts without materially altering their meaning.
• Copyright in a published manuscript vests jointly with the author(s) and NLIU; publishing it elsewhere later needs the Editorial Board's prior permission and an acknowledgment that it first appeared in the symposium proceedings.

Abstracts are submitted only through the official Google Form (linked below), and each author receives a confirmation of submission. The brochure's original abstract deadline of 25 September 2026 has been extended by the Cell to 28 September 2026.

Selected authors will be notified by 5 October 2026 and must then register (individually or as a team of up to two) on payment of a registration fee of Rs 500, and submit the full manuscript by 5 November 2026. Manuscripts undergo a double-blind editorial process of technical, content and peer review. The Top 15 will be selected for presentation at the symposium, and a further registration fee, inclusive of food and accommodation, will then be payable (the amount is not stated in the brochure). The Top 10 will be published in the Special Edition of the NLIU Journal of Law and Technology; this selection is independent of the oral-round scores, which count only towards the awards.

Besides a cash prize and trophy, the first-placed performer at the symposium will receive an internship at Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas & Co. The brochure notes that the award details are indicative, pending finalisation on approval by the Faculty-in-Charge.