Training Facilities

Classroom: Presently, LETI enjoys the facility of four well-equipped classrooms, two in the premise of Old High Court Building and two on the third floor of Bangladesh Bar Council with a total capacity of 197 seats. Apart from that, the hall room of LETI has a capacity for 32 seats. LETI also uses the Tribunal Room with the permission of the Bar Council for holding Moot Court. With generous support of all the Hon'ble Chief Justices over last several years LETI has been allowed the facilities of the Court Room during vacation to be used for advocacy training conducted by the Australian Team of Q.Cs as well as to allow other necessary facilities for conducting classes, seminars and workshop. The Bar Council canteen is available to the participants during course programs.

The most urgent need for LETI is to have its own building and premises. The adjacent vacant land has been earmarked for LETI as chosen by the then Chief Justice Mr. Shahabuddin Ahmed for building its own facilities. In order to materialize the project on an urgent basis a delegation met the Honble President. The Chief Patron of the Institute advised for a follow up with the Hon'ble Chief Justice and the government for formal permission to build on the land so earmarked for the institute earlier by the Chief Patron. A map prepared for that purpose to use the land so earmarked was presented to the Hon'ble President as well as to the Honble Chief Justice of the Supreme Court along with the prayer for the necessary permission. This is now under active consideration of the Honble Chief Justice Mr. Latifur Rahman. LETI has a plan to mobilize initial fund for preparation of a design in order to build facilities consisting of own auditorium, classrooms, seminar rooms, library, moot court, computer lab with Internet facilities and audiovisual facilities having language lab for advocacy training.

Equipment: Over the years, LETI has been venturing to modernize the training facilities of the institute within its modest means. It is now equipped with four state-of-the art multimedia computers, one television, four video cameras, one Video Cassette Recorder, one Video Compact Disk Player, five microphone sets, two Overhead Projectors and their accessories. To enhance the current provisions of training and education, LETI plans to increase the number of computers in the near future with a goal to share the facility for one-man-one computer, CD-ROM I Internet based study sessions.

Library: LETI faculty members and trainees have access to Bar Council Library, equipped with more than 3000 (three thousand) books, journals, documents and research materials covering various fields of law including criminology and social studies. The library has grown over the years through personal donations as well as contributions from the Chairman, Mr. M. Amir-ul Islam, Australian Bar Association and the Asia Foundation. Some of the important journals are All England Law Report, Halsbury's Laws of England, The law Reports (for England and Wales), The Weekly Law Report, The Australian Law Journal, The International Journal of Refugee Law and The Bangladesh Gazette. DHAKA LAW REPORTS AND BLD (a Law Journal published by Bar Council). The institute has already chalked out a plan to increase the number of books in the library by several times within a short period.

Funding

LETI derives it's funds through it's own earning as course fees, personal contributions of LETI members, government contribution through the Ministry of Law and foreign grants from donor agencies including The Royal Netherlands Embassy, CIDA, the British High Commission, British Council. Details of the sources are to be found in the financial report. We are also expecting active support from Royal Danish Embassy for BVC course conducted by LETI, and other partners such as Norwegian Embassy, USIS and Swiss support who have indicated their willingness to sponsor some of the major programs undertaken as projects for Millennium 2000.

Organization and Human Resources

Having the President of the People's Republic of Bangladesh as the Chief Patron, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court as its President LETI may also pride itself is to leading institute for legal training.

A team of resource persons consists of sitting Judges of the Supreme Court, Senior Advocates and academics conducting the course along with whole time instructors. The classes and the training activities are monitored through a chain of Training Coordinators and their Assistants. The Instructors and Researchers of LETI try to enhance their training capabilities through active sharing and participation in various training of trainers (TOT) programs, seminars and workshops. The institute has a multidisciplinary approach in developing its human resources and thus far has included several experts from other fields of profession including Public Health, Environment and Sociology to tackle legal issues within our socio-cultural framework in an integrated fashion. Our course materials and curriculum is designed towards Justice education with high priority for human rights issues integrated in designing the course.

Apart from conducting courses through its ten regular instructors, LETI freely selects appropriate trainers and lecturers from a large resource bank of distinct legal experts of the country to meet the demand of each program. These resource persons include eminent judges, professors, advocates, human rights activists and English language trainers with high skill and standing in the area. There is regular evaluation of trainers and resource persons by the participants. It is in this process over the last 6 years LETI has been able to select those as its regular trainers and resource persons through rigorous selection process. We acknowledge with thanks the contribution so far received from the Royal Netherlands Embassy for the support of HRTP course, and to Canadian High Commission and CIDA for the support to Gender Sensitization Training Program for Lawyers, and for the help and support of British High Commission and British Council helping us to design the course "English for Law and training the trainers for teaching English for Lawyers. We are also indebted for the support already promised by USlS to sponsor a course on professional ethics and training in ADR for the new entrants to the Bar to be integrated within BVC course. All of these help and support contributed towards capacity building of LETI, as it contains to develop its program towards high standard.

Services

Besides Bar Vocational Course, round-the-year services provided by LETI in its continuing efforts to upgrade Legal Education and competence of law graduates of

Bangladesh include the followings amongst others:

•           Assistance in designing Law curricula for universities and law colleges; improving Law teaching methods by incorporating practical training for law teacher; and introducing and preparing pre-law and professional orientation courses.

•           Syllabus and curricula designing and setting question papers for compulsory written examinations conducted by Bangladesh Bar Council. (Some of the question papers are printed at the back to indicate the quality it wants to achieve.)

•           Building general awareness about the Rule of Law, Human Rights and for skill development among law graduates, Advocates, legal managers, law enforcement Officers, NGO activists and policy makers both in government and private sectors.

•           Undertaking original research in various branches of Law as well as scrutinizing the existing law for recommending legislative reforms through research cells set up by LETI.

•           Publishing journals, research papers, reports, books and brochures on a regular basis, updating LETI activities round the year and promoting important issues of improving the efficacy of the Law and the legal system in the country.

•           Help research in matters relating to violation of Human rights, Civil Liberties and Rule of Law as may be deemed fit and imparting training to those who are engaged in Public Interest Litigation and Human Rights issues.

•           Building awareness among the victims of derogation, mobilizing legal support and giving training for rendering legal aid services to those victims with special emphasis on women & children, poor and the disadvantaged and ethnic and religious minorities.

•           Helping, organizing and sponsoring nationwide conferences, workshops, seminars and lectures on Law, Legal Profession, role of the bar and of the Judiciary and on good governance and disseminating information on human rights norms and creating awareness as to the need and method for preventing violation.