How to solve the legal reasoning section in CLAT | If you are a Common Law Admission Test (CLAT) aspirant, in all probabilities, you would be up against close to 50,000 competitors – with the number spiking every year – from over 20 cities in India.
So how does one tackle the different sections so as to make a distinctive mark and strike an advantage? While CLAT has several sections to solve, one of the key parts is the legal reasoning.
The Legal Aptitude section in CLAT consists of two parts – the Legal Knowledge section and the Legal Reasoning one. The legal reasoning is geared towards testing your application of the principle of law that has been provided to you. What this means is you are not tested on your knowledge of the laws, bills, and statutes. Rather, how do you apply your aptitude and acumen to resolving an issue at hand in the legal reasoning section? Trust OPUS to guide and mentor you all the way along.
You will be provided with the situations and accompanying facts, the principle you need to apply and expected to arrive at an appropriate decision or make a judgment applying the given principle to solve the questions in the legal reasoning section in CLAT. Remember, you need to keep your opinion, judgment, viewpoints, arguments and prior knowledge at bay. Don’t delve into what you think should be the right decision; focus on what judgment call you should make applying the principle provided to you. There will be four options that you have to choose from and sometimes they will be so close that they will sound tricky. However, if you concentrate solely on the facts and principle, making a decision to solve the legal reasoning section in CLAT will be easier. OPUS provides you the gateway to navigate through these tricky terrains.
Contents
Topics to prepare for legal reasoning
While preparing to solve the legal reasoning section in CLAT, the key topics you need to focus on are as follows:
- Law of Torts
- Contracts
- Criminal law
- Constitutional law
Trends in CLAT
The legal reasoning section carries 50 marks. However, over the last few years, there has been varying trends in the number of questions in CLAT related to legal reasoning.
In 2013, the legal reasoning section became time-consuming for many students because there were questions of varying difficulty and attempting all questions in the allotted time became a major challenge for aspirants. In 2014, while there were questions from criminal law, Hindu law, contracts and torts, there were none on testing legal knowledge, intellectual property rights (IPR) or international law. The team of CLAT experts at OPUS ensures you can tackle all kinds of questions and takes you extensively through the format of previous years.In 2015, while the legal reasoning section was relatively easy, there was focus on legal knowledge and general knowledge questions.
Legal reasoning section in CLAT is an important segment in the paper because in case of a tie in the other sections, the score in the legal reasoning section will help you scrape through. OPUS prepares you for a variety of dynamic and challenging situations you may be faced with when you appear for CLAT and is widely trusted by aspirants across the country.
Find below few Sample questions from legal reasoning section :
#1.
- Principle: If the consideration or object of an agreement is forbidden by law, or is of such a nature that would defeat the provisions of any law, or is fraudulent, or is injurious to the person or property of another or, the Court regards it as immoral, or opposed to public policy, then the object or consideration shall be deemed unlawful. Every agreement of which the object or consideration is unlawful is void.
- Situation: Sohag enters into a contract with Rajesh whereby Rajesh will supply Sohag with 50 grams of marijuana for a specified amount. Is the contract valid?
- Options:
a. No, because the contract is for the sale of illegal drugs.
b. No, because Sohag and Rajesh have entered into the contract out of their own free will.
c. No, because drugs are harmful.
d. None of these.
#2.
- Principle: Nothing which is not intended to cause death, is an offence by reason of any harm which it may cause, or be intended by the doer to cause, or be known by the doer to be likely to cause, to any person for whose benefit it is done in good faith, and who has given a consent, whether express or implied, to suffer that harm, or to take the risk of that harm.
- Situation: The doctor performed a surgeryonthe patient for removal of kidney stones. The patient wasalready an HIV-positive and was warned by the doctor of all risks, including that it could be fatal.The patient, however,went ahead with the risks and signed a bond certifying that he is aware of all risks and possible fatality. During the operation, the patient died of a haemorrhage.
- Options:
a.The doctor is guilty of murder.
b.The doctor is not guilty.
c.The doctor is guilty of culpable homicide not amounting to murder.
d. None of these.
#3.
The violation of which of the given rights leads to an action in torts?
a.Rights in rem.
b. Rights in personam.
c. Rights ad infinitum.
d. Rights per se.
#4.
- Principle: A person is liable for the tort of negligence if he breaches a legal duty of care he owes to the plaintiff, and the plaintiff suffered a damage resulting from this breach.
- Situation: A partygoer starts driving on the highway off the bar after consuming alcohol way higher than the permissible limit. An approaching Merc car driver was driving with the headlights turned off. The two vehicles collided resulting in the Merc driver being injured. The partygoer could have avoided the collision if he had been alert but was heavily intoxicated to apply his mind. The Merc driver sued the party goer for negligence. Will he win?
- Options:
a.Yes, because the partygoer should be taught a lesson.
b. Yes, because partygoer breached the duty of care that he owes to the other people commuting on the highway.
c. No, because the Merc driver provided the partygoer with only a narrow window of time to avoid the collision.
d. No, because they had no business driving on the highway late into the night.
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