"May this please your honor, or Lordship"

I am not supposed to be doing this. I am sitting in the library, writing my blog. Call that vehlapan or what? I am back, just as promised when it is humanly possible. Trust me, that last three days, were pretty hectic, two tests and a moot. Now many of my darling readers ( I have over the last few days, figured out, there are actually people who read my random rantings) are non law school students, so the first natural question that might have popped up in your heads should have been, what is a moot?

Now, a moot as defined by god-knows-who is "Moot court is an extracurricular activity at many law schools in which participants take part in simulated court proceedings, usually to include drafting briefs and participating in oral argument. The term derives from Anglo Saxon times, when a moot (gmot or emot) was a gathering of prominent men in a locality to discuss matters of local importance".

A moot as defined by me, after almost two semesters in a Law school is, "Time for us to trade our jeans with the uncomfortable formals, trying to look all important, holding a memo made in one night in our hand, and finally getting screwed by the Judge, who in our case is the 'course teacher'". I can see most law students nodding their heads.

It starts out as a week of torture, the moot problem is released, we are supposed to work on it, try to actually make a full written submission of what our arguments are a day before the actual moot. Trust me that never happens, in our law school most students are often seen in the printing section of the library trying to print a memorial 10 to 20 minutes before the start of their moot.

Once the memo is actually in your hands, you proceed to the Court Hall ( nah just a huge classroom in our case). You start speaking, as the counsel for the plaintiffs or the petitioners, defendants or the respondants, with an opening line like, "May this pleas your honor, ", then your are arguments are generally punctuated with "Obliged your Lordship", "Counsel stands enlightened".

So when you are arguing you try to act all important by stating zillions of already decided cases, arguing with the judge, and all other weird things. You will be lucky if the Jugde does not ask you questions like, "If you sit in a room with open windows, arnt you in open air?", well what can you say...just smile and say, "The cousel pleads ignorance".

My favorite moot till now, was a contracts case on advertisement contracts in cricket tournaments, where I represented the Pakistan Cricket Board. I had loads a fun making the memo, and also while arguing the case.

In fact I had a moot today, which went off pretty well. So, despite all the cribbing I cannot deny one important fact, your Lordship, though I may easily be one of the worst mooters in my class, I still am uncontrollably, irrevocably in love with the fine art of mooting!

THE COUNSEL RESTS THE CASE.
(and thanks the readers for a patient reading)