SNDT WOMEN’S UNIVERSITY

LAW SCHOOL, SANTACRUZ

SUBJECT: LEGAL EDUCATION AND RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

SEMINAR TOPIC- COMPUTERIZED LEGAL RESEARCH

ACADEMIC YEAR: - 2021-22

NAME: TRUPTI SHRIKRISHNA DABKE.

CLASS: FIRST YEAR, LLM.

ROLL NO: 16

SUBMITTED TO: PROF. MAHIMA PREM.

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 COMPUTERIZED LEGAL RESEARCH

Introduction-

 Legal research is “the process of identifying and retrieving information necessary to

support legal decision-making. In its broadest sense, legal research includes each step of a
course of action that begins with an analysis of the facts of a Controversy and concludes
with the appliance and communication of the results of the investigation.”

Meaning of Computerized Research-

 Computer Assisted Legal Research (CALR) or Computer Organized Legal Research

(COLR) is a mode of legal research that uses legal databases of court opinions, statutes,
court documents, and secondary material.
 Computer Assisted Legal Research (CALR) or Computer Organized Legal Research
(COLR) or social networking sites provide new ways for legal professionals to find law.
 Computerized Research: - Computers do facilitate the research work. Innumerable data can
be processed and analyzed with greater ease and speed.

Purpose-

 Computer assisted Legal Research is used extensively by undergraduate and postgraduate

law students. The Professors of law and Professional lawyers can rely on the computer-
assisted legal research in order to properly understand the status of law and to act effectively
in the best interest of their client.
 The Sources of Computerized Legal Research available online include:
i. Texts of statutes, statutory instruments, civil codes, etc.;
ii. Explanatory notes and government publications relating to statutes and their
operation;
iii. Texts of governing documents such as Constitutions and treaties;
iv. Case judgments;
v. Journals on legal matters or legal theory;
vi. Dictionaries and legal encyclopedia;
vii. Legal texts and materials in the form of e-books;

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 viii. Current affairs and market information;
ix. Educational information on the law and its operation.

Significance-

 As early within the year 1988, “the Law commission of India felt the requirement of
computerization in Library & Information Centers within the Courts due to the explosion
of legal literature and recommended that Computerization of Library could be a high
priority necessity.”
 In 1991 the National Informatics center require up the project of computerization of
Supreme Court and High Courts and interconnect them through NIC-NET.
 In an era of Computerized Legal Research, Right to Information Act, 2005 enacted by the
Parliament has also brought out a silent revolution in Computerized Legal Research, as
Section 4 of the Act makes it mandatory for each Governmental Authority to produce the
data and make it available on respective Governmental Department website and give access
to public.

Advantages-

 Time efficiency.
 Cost effective – Save money.
 Rapid availability of documents.
 Principal advantage is word search-unique identifiable information.
 Updated information
 Helps researcher to store, modify, or reutilized the information.

Disadvantages-

 Machine – do not think.

 Search common words.
 Synonyms as ambiguity.
 Cost Prohibitive to research. E.g. Lexis, Westlaw etc.
 Require Proper training and practice.

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Types of Electronic databases use for legal research-

 Westlaw India & International Westlaw

 LexisNexis India
 JSTOR
 SCC Online
 Manupatra
 CLA Online
 Indiastat

Various government and non-governmental agencies are involved in free access to legal and law
related information in India. Such as Government took initiatives to provide information relating
to rules, regulations regarding the functions of all ministries work on their official website.

Survey report of computerized research/ Artificial intelligence adopted by law firms

 The performance of artificial intelligence in the legal sector has been very successful, the
rate at which it’s being deployed, at least in India, is abysmal. 100% of lawyers in the US
and 95% in the UK have adopted AI, but only 4% of Indian lawyers use AI capabilities in
their operation — even though 95% of Indian Courts have been Digitized.

Conclusion-

 Nowadays Computer plays an important role in every legal field. The computer seize the
ideas of many researchers and also gives an opportunity to store more quantity of data in
small space.
 The unique contribution of the computerized legal information retrieval would appear to
lie in the fact that it offers the lawyer a new and different method of accessing the law. It
improve the general research habit and development in future.

References-

 Bibliography- Legal Research Methodology, Dr. S. R. Myneni, Allahabad Law Agency.

 Webliography- The Legal Research Tools Lawyers are using - https://www.llrx.com/
 Use of law library in legal research- http://epgp.inflibnet.ac.in/