Noted legal luminary, and the driving force behind the creation of autonomous National Law Universities in India, Professor N R Madhava Menon, passed away at the age of 84 yesterday while admitted at a hospital in Thirvananthapuram, reports The News Minute.

Menon was the founding director of India’s first National Law University, the National Law School of India (NLSIU), Bangalore, and was also the founder Vice-Chancellor of the National University of Judicial Sciences in Kolkata.

He also had a role in founding the National Judicial Academy, Bhopal, which imparts training to judicial officers.

Menon began his legal career after graduating from the Government Law College of Thiruvananthapuram and Ernakulam in 1955. He started his practice at the High Court of Kerala, later on moving to become a faculty member at the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU).

Thereafter, in 1965, he shifted to Delhi and became the Professor and Head of the Campus Law Centre at Delhi University. Menon finished his PhD and LLM from AMU.

At the request of the Bar Council of India (BCI), he moved base again, this time to Bengaluru, in order to establish NLSIU, and begin a new form of legal education in India, with an integrated five-year law course.

Menon also went on to serve as the president of the BCI.

A number of public personalities expressed their condolences over his demise.

“Sorry to hear of the passing of Prof N.R. Madhava Menon, educationist, scholar and a pioneering spirit behind modern legal education in India, beginning with National Law School of India University, Bangalore. My condolences to his family and countless students,” President Ram Nath Kovind said in a statement.