Human Rights and Legal Services for Children and Youth: Global Perspectives

About

Prof. Dr. Asha Bajpai recently retired from Tata Institute of Social Sciences Mumbai and is now a visiting faculty at several national and international law schools. She obtained her MPhil and PhD in law from the National Law School of India University Bangalore; and specializes in child rights law public health law access to justice for vulnerable and disadvantaged. She has been involved in teaching research training gender justice issues legal aid clinical education and legislative reform relating to vulnerable for more than three decades. She has several publications to her credit. Her book Child Rights in India -- Law Policy and Practice is now in its third edition. Her other publications include From Exploitation to Empowerment: A Socio-Legal Model of Rehabilitation and Reintegration of Intellectually Disabled Children (authored book 2018)  Adoption Law and Justice to the Child (authored for institution 1996) Child Sexual Abuse - Need forLaw Reform (Indian Journal of Social Work) etc.  She is lead speaker resource person and faculty at various national and international universities and conferences. She was a Fulbright lecturer at the Washington College of Law American University where she designed and taught a course to LLM and JD students on International and Comparative Child Rights Law.As Professor of Law and Founding Dean of School of Law at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) Mumbai India she designed the unique LLM course on Access to Justice for preparing community lawyers. She has been involved in several law reform projects and capacity building of judicial and law enforcement officials. She was Project Director of field action projects such as Legal Services Clinic for the marginalized and vulnerable groups and Chunauti (challenge) for rehabilitation and social reintegration of orphan children in institutions. Regularly invited as Amicus Curiae and expert by Mumbai and Delhi High Courts in Public Interest Litigation she was also the Invited Expert at the UNESCO High Level meeting on ECCE (early childhood care and education) and with UNODC on Education for Justice. She does consultancy assignments for United Nations and Global Justice Sector Workforce and continues her capacity building and law reform work.Professor David Tushaus is Associate Dean of Graduate and Experiential Education at Jigme Singye Wangchuck School of Law Bhutan. He was a Fulbright-Nehru Scholar in 2012 at Banaras Hindu University (BHU) Varanasi India. He also served as a Fulbright Specialist for the University of The Gambia Faculty of Law in 2017. He was an International Clinician in Residence and Fulbright Specialist in Myanmar in the summer of 2018 and 2019. He was then an Ambassadors Distinguished Scholar at Bahir Dar School of Law Bahir Dar University Ethiopia. Professor Tushaus was a staff attorneyand clinic director for the Midwest Innocence Project and the University of Missouri Kansas City. Prior to that he was a professor in the Department of Criminal Justice Legal Studies and Social Work and chairperson for ten years at Missouri Western State University. He developed service-learning approaches to teaching legal research legal drafting election law and human rights. Earlier he worked for Legal Aid of Western Missouri obtaining grants supervising staff and handling cases involving government benefits health care consumer issues domestic violence disabilities and farm problems. Awards for his advocacy include a 1995 Missouri Health Law Advocacy Award for state-wide work for consumer protections. More recently he received the Missouri Governors Award for Excellence in Education in 2011.Dr. M.R.K. Prasad is Professor of Law at V.M. Salgaocar College of Law Goa India. He has served the same institute as Principal from 2015 to 2020and as Dean Faculty of Law and Chairman Board of Studies in Law at Goa University. He has also served as Professor of Law at the Indian Law Institute New Delhi India. He is instrumental in establishing and functionalizing Community Legal Aid Clinics set up in the Indian State of Goa. He was a member of the core team to design and teach in Winter Intersession India International & Comparative Human Rights Law Practicum a joint venture between law schools in India and the United States. He was a member of the Committee constituted by the Chief Justice of India & Patron-in-Chief NALSA for preparing SOP/guidelines for the legal services institutions engaging Legal Aid/Services Clinics set up in the law schools colleges and universities in India; Member of Goa NGO Accreditation Committee constituted by the Women and Child Department Government of Goa; Member of the Goa State Commission for Protection of Child Rights; Member of Committee to Draft Goa State Prison Rules and Member of the Expert Committee for Diploma in Legal Literacy Program Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU). He was a member of developing e-content on Access to Justice for the University Grants Commission (UGC)s Project on E-Pathshala for Post Graduate Courses in Law. He also contributed to course content for School of Law IGNOU and UGC. He has published several scholarly articles and essays in leading law journals including Clinical Law Review Journal of Indian Law Institute and Delhi Law Review apart from regularly contributing to the Annual Survey of Indian Law since 2012. During his tenure as Principal at V.M. Salgaocar College of Law he was the founding Director of the institute's Moot Court Society its ADR Board and Chairman of its Legal Aid Society.