Law as a career is becoming popular among students. Not only after senior secondary but also after completing the bachelors, students are preferring law as their career option. Entrance examination like The Common Law Admission Test (CLAT) also demand a lot of focus for preparation along with determination and perseverance to crack these and enter reputed colleges.
An aspiring law student should focus on some key strategies that they should make use of to maximise their perfect score in each section of the CLAT. The most important ones are as follows:
�Legal aptitude: The most important section to attempt in CLAT this year is the legal aptitude section. Candidates should try to give their best while dealing with questions of the legal aptitude section consisting of two parts—Legal Reasoning and Legal Knowledge. For Legal Reasoning questions, candidates need to read the question cautiously and understand before solving the part. For Legal Knowledge section, the candidates need to memorise a set of Legal Maxims for accurate usage of the legal terminologies. The focus should be on current Legal news and some recent important cases before Supreme Court.
�General awareness: The general knowledge section includes 50 questions from Static GK and Current Affairs. This section is important as it helps save time and one can utilise this to allocate time to more significant sections of the examination. This section also helps to increase the overall score as the questions asked are factual and direct. If you prepare for the CLAT GK section properly, it will help in covering many other aspects of the CLAT Legal Aptitude section that has questions on Legal GK also.
� Numerical ability: This section has 20 questions. The major focus is on class X level mathematics. Many students are scared of mathematics, but if a student is regularly practicing the basic concepts he/she is sure to solve most of the questions from this section. To prepare for the mathematics section, candidates need to practice more and number of quantitative aptitude questions. The questions will cover a varied number of topics including number systems, percentages, time speed and distance, time and work, algebra, coordinate geometry, trigonometry, and probability. You should spend around 15 minutes on this section.
� Logical reasoning: It is again a very unpredictable section. The unfamiliarity of students with this section makes it difficult. It has 40 questions, which are based on coding-decoding, family tree, arrangements, syllogisms and critical reasoning. Critical reasoning is the most important part of this section. An ideal number of attempts in this section is 32 to 35 with 90 per cent accuracy.
� Verbal ability: This section mostly has questions which test your reading skills. A lot of students tend to leave Reading Comprehension because they lack aptitude for reading. The reasons to leave reading comprehension are that it consumes time and also, the accuracy level is low. One should practice a lot as it is highly recommended that you should attempt Reading Comprehension questions because just by reading one passage you will be able to answer five to 10 questions. If you work a little on improving reading skills, it will also help you in attempting questions based on Sentence Completion and Sentence Arrangement.
� Vocabulary: Another important aspect of the verbal section is vocabulary. The paper has a lot of questions on synonym-antonym. These questions become difficult if you do not have command over it. One should focus on increasing the word base.
� Grammar: The questions are on English usage. Spot the errors and phrase substitution are the major type of questions asked. Out of the total 120 minutes that you get, you should spend around 20 to 25 minutes on this section in which you should try to attempt about 25 to 30 question.
Practice makes the man perfect. Everything comes up with practicing with dedication and patience. If a student believes that going to tuitions, doing assignments and attend classes regularly are enough to get through the CLAT, is not at all true. Go through assignments, keep track on changing trends, read about current affairs, regular practicing to improve the speed to complete paper on time are the important strategies to crack CLAT.
With very few days left for the exam, every moment is precious for students to turn the dreams of getting admission into the best law college into a reality. So just remember – devote as much time as you can in a day to hard work and efficient studies.
(The writer is national product head law, Pratham Education, New Delhi)