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Call for Paper | Delhi Journal for Law and Justice Law Centre-II, Faculty of Law, University of Delhi Student Run Journal [2026 Issue]

Editor
DJLJ Call for Papers 2026

I. AIMS AND SCOPE

The Delhi Journal for Law and Justice (DJLJ) is the student-run journal of Law Centre-II, Faculty of Law, University of Delhi. It is a double blind peer-reviewed academic journal focused on publishing original, high-quality research in the field of law and justice. The journal encourages discussion on important legal issues and promotes critical engagement with legal theories and practices. It adds to the ongoing discussion about justice, governance, rights, and duties in India and beyond. The Aims and Scope of DJLJ are:

  1. To publish original, peer-reviewed work of law students that addresses current legal and policy challenges in India and other countries.

  2. To support interdisciplinary research that brings in insights from Political Science, Economics, Sociology, History, and other relevant fields that enhance the understanding of law and justice.

  3. To provide a platform for both new and established scholars, practitioners and law students to engage in informed and critical discussions that generate new legal knowledge.

  4. To encourage contributions that connect legal theory with practice by combining empirical research, case studies, and policy analysis.

  5. To seek a global audience and build an academic community that fosters innovative legal thought focused on justice, fairness, and ethical considerations.

  6. To maintain high standards of peer review and editorial integrity while ensuring a transparent and efficient publication process.

II. ELIGIBILITY TO SUBMIT

The Delhi Journal for Law and Justice invites submissions from an inclusive group of authors with the condition that authorship and copyright agreements follow the Journal’s standard academic publishing guidelines. The Journal is excited to receive original, unpublished manuscripts from undergraduate and postgraduate students, as well as research scholars, legal practitioners and policy practitioners.

Interdisciplinary approaches to law are welcome if they involve using an accepted legal methodology. Acceptable methodologies include the use of doctrinal analysis, the use of a composite approach, the employment of an empirical legal study, or conducting socio-legal research, which demonstrate a growing trend among legal scholars across institutional lines. In addition, the Journal will allow collaborative authorship with for two collaborators only, promoting the idea of collaboration while maintaining clarity regarding the responsibilities for and accountability of jointly submitted work.

III. SUBMISSIONS CATEGORIES

Manuscripts may be submitted to the Delhi Journal for Law and Justice in the following categories:

  1. Long Articles: Submissions in this category are expected to engage with the theme and literature of a particular topic in a comprehensive manner. Word limit: 5,000—8,000 (exclusive of footnotes).

    Suggested Structure

    Author(s) must include all these components, although they need not be listed in any particular order:

    1. An outline of how the area has developed during a specified time period, identifying key issues addressed in the area and identifying important research methods used for the manuscript.

    2. A thorough summary and critical review of key literature that are needed to understand the area of research.

    3. Conceptual framework should be employed by the author(s). The author(s) must include description of the analysis structure for analysing the development in the area of research including the most salient issues in it and a discussion of existing frameworks and the author’s preferred framework(s).

    4. The main issues in the area, both substantive and methodological, shall be presented critically in the manuscript.

    5. Future research suggestions should be provided as well.

  2. Short Articles: Submissions in this category are expected to engage with the theme and must be written in a concise and clear manner ensuring brevity of thought in cross-disciplinary spectrum. Word limit: 3,000—5,000 (exclusive of footnotes).

  3. Legislative / Case Comments: Comments critically evaluating recent judicial decisions, landmark cases, legislation, or bills. Word limit: 1,500—2,000 (exclusive of footnotes).

  4. Book Reviews: Book Reviews to critically assess books on law and justice-related themes. Word limit: 1,000—1,200.

SUGGESTED THEMES

This Call for Paper is open for the following topics:

  1. Current issues of legal significance, both at the national and international level, or

  2. Recent developments and judicial pronouncements in the field of law, or

  3. Comparative law and legal systems, or

  4. Interdisciplinary legal studies

IV. SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

  1. All submissions should be wholly original, have never been published and not under review by another publication. Any instance of plagiarism or self-plagiarism will result in immediate rejection.

  2. A maximum of one co-authorship is allowed within any of the aforementioned submission categories, with the exceptions of Case Comment and Book Review for which do not allow for co-authorship.

  3. Submission must adhere to aforementioned category based word limit. The Editorial Board retains discretion to allow for flexibility around these limits, based on the depth and quality of research. Howbeit, extension may be permitted for only up to an additional 500 words.

  4. All submissions (Short Articles and Long Articles) must include an abstract of about 200 – 250 words, clearly outlining the thesis, argumentative structure of the submission and highlighting the major contributing points/information contained in the submission. In addition, five (5) Keywords need to be included in conjunction with the abstract.

  5. Focus on current legal issues, Indian law and sub judice matters is generally preferred.

  6. Use of gender-neutral language is suggested.

  7. The Author(s) are required to confirm that there is no third-party rights infringement.

  8. Strict policy of maintaining exclusivity shall be followed which indicates no simultaneous submissions.

  9. Final acceptance vests with DJLJ Editorial Board.

  10. Non-compliance of any aforementioned guideline may lead to preliminary rejection.

V. FORMATTING GUIDELINES

  1. The first page of the manuscript should only contain the title of the paper followed by a 200-250 words abstract. The second page should commence with the main body of the manuscript.

  2. Submissions should be put in Times New Roman, font size 12 with 1.5 line spacing, justified text and 1-inch margins on all sides of the A4 sheet.

  3. Footnotes in Times New Roman typeface, font size 10, with 1.0 line spacing.

  4. Footnote numbers should be placed at the end of quotation or sentence. But when referring to a specific word or phrase, the footnote number should be placed directly after the word or phrase in the manuscript.

  5. Footnotes should conform to 21st Edition of The Bluebook ‘a Uniform System Of Citation’ Rules.

  6. Please note that submissions with endnotes will be rejected on prima facie inspection.

  7. For submissions involving empirical research, authors must submit authentic & relevant datasets along with the article. The datasets must be graphically organised in a presentable manner. Avoid blur graphs, images and pictorial representation of datasets.

  8. All headings must have uniform formatting.

  9. Headings: The number of levels of headings should not preferably exceed four and each heading must be numbered.

    1. First Level Heading

      The main headings should be centred, emboldened and typed in upper case, symbolised with capital Roman numerals (I, II, III, etc.). This format helps to create a clear and consistent structure for the document as well as to highlight the main topics and subtopics.

      2. E.g., I. INTRODUCTION

    2. Second Level Heading

      The headings for the second level should have the first letter of each word in uppercase and be aligned to the left and bolded. Before the heading, there should be a capital letter (A, B, C, etc.).

      3. E.g., A. Legal Scrutiny of the Case Law

    3. Third Level Heading

      The headings for the third level should have a bold font and align to the left, with only the initial word starting with a capital letter. Use Arabic numerals (1, 2, 3, etc.) before the heading text.

      4. E.g., 2. Contours of the judgment

    4. Fourth Level Heading

      The fourth level headings should be aligned to the left margin and written in italics. Only the initial letter of the first word should be capitalised. The headings should have a lower-case Roman numeral in parentheses before them ((i), (ii), (iii), etc.).

      5. E.g. (i) Reference to a matter in dispute

  10. Quotations:

    1. For quotations within the text, use single quotation mark.

    2. For quotations within quotations, use double quotation mark.

    3. Where the quotation exceeds fifty words, it should be typed as a separate paragraph.

  11. Punctuation:

    1. For quotations

      All punctuation marks, except full stops which are not part of the quoted sentence, must fall within quotation marks.

      2. E.g., ‘All those narratives,’ he said, ‘were based on biased perspectives.’

    2. For footnoting

      All footnoting numbers must be placed after the punctuation.

      3. E.g., X supports the idea,1 but Y opposes it.2

VI. SUBMISSION PROCESS

  1. DJLJ accepts manuscripts through electronic mode of submissions.

  2. Author(s) intending to contribute to 2026 Issue of the DJLJ should send the full manuscript by 15th May 2026, 11:59 p.m. IST. Short Articles and Long Articles must be accompanied by an abstract not exceeding 200-250 words.

  3. The full manuscript must be submitted on the official website of DJLJ i.e. djlj.lc2.du.ac.in

  4. All submissions must contain the manuscript in Word (.doc or .docx) & PDF (.pdf) format on the official website. No other formats/hard copy submissions will be accepted.

  5. For co-authored papers, details of both the authors should be given in the body of the email.

  6. Co-authorship is not allowed for Legislative / Case Comments and Book Reviews.

  7. Any form of submission in violation to the understated AI Plagiarism Policy will lead to disqualification for publication.

VII. DOUBLE BLIND PEER REVIEW PROCESS

The Delhi Journal for Law and Justice (DJLJ) employs a fair and efficient review process. Acknowledgment of receiving is typically sent within 30 days of submission, with preliminary editorial reviews completed in four to six weeks of acknowledgement.

DJLJ has a multi-step double-blind peer review process:

  1. Initial Review: Editors and reviewers check for anonymity, word count, and formatting, rejecting outright any submissions that are not exclusive and not suitable.

  2. The first editorial review includes checking for language clarity, the existence of a specific problem, paper structure, research depth, novelty/originality and contribution to academia. The editor may reject outrightly, ask for further review or ask the author to rewrite and re-submit the article.

  3. The second peer review is completed by the same editorial members as in step B along with two or more external peer experts from the advisory board who assess methodology, novel component, scholarly rigor, literature engagement and impact of the article. Reviewers recommend acceptance, revision or rejection of the manuscript.

  4. The authors must edit their manuscript as per the comments they received via trailing mail and meet the deadlines outlined for final editing of their manuscripts prior to publication. The editorial board will perform substantive and line editing of all approved manuscripts according to DJLJ’s style and will allow authors to review the edits before distribution to readers.

Note: Timelines may be extended if the editorial board requests any author(s) for revision at any time during the review process. The aforementioned timelines may be revised for improving efficiency.

VIII. AI AND PLAGIARISM POLICY

  1. All submissions sent to the DJLJ must be original and free from plagiarised content. The University Grants Commission (Promotion of Academic Integrity and Prevention of Plagiarism in Higher Educational Institutions) Regulations 2018 apply regarding permissible plagiarism limits.

  2. The Journal will implement a rigid AI policy within the context of written submissions. AI cannot be used by Authors to create any content or citations in any way. AI can only be used by Authors to do minor editing, such as proofreading and rewording sentences.

IX. GENERAL POLICIES

  1. Open Access Policy

    The Delhi Journal for Law and Justice makes all published submissions instantly accessible to everyone all over the world.

  2. Copyright and Licensing

    Upon publication, author(s) de-facto grant the Delhi Journal for Law and Justice a royalty-free and transferable license to publish, archive, index, and distribute the work in print, electronic formats, databases and open access repositories for the full copyright term.

  3. Indemnification

    By submitting, authors agree to indemnify and hold harmless the Delhi Journal for Law and Justice and its hosting institution against claims, suits, or liabilities from alleged copyright infringement, unauthorised use, or rights violations arising from publication.

Note:

  1. The Editorial Board of DJLJ will conduct a strict editorial review of the submissions and hereby retains absolute discretion with respect to acceptance/rejection of the manuscripts.

  2. Law Centre-II shall be the sole copyright owner of all published submissions. Apart from fair dealing for research, private study, or critique, no part of the journal may be copied, adapted, abridged, translated, stored in any retrieval system including computer, photographic, or other systems, or reproduced in any form or by any means whether electronic, mechanical, digital, optical, photographic, or otherwise.

Deadline for submissions is Thursday, 15th May 2026, 11:59 p.m. IST.

at

Official Website of DJLJ

For Further Assistance or Any Queries:

Write to us at: delhijournalforlawandjustice@lc2.du.ac.in

The Editorial Board

Delhi Journal for Law and Justice (DJLJ)

Law Centre-II,

Faculty of Law, University of Delhi

Delhi — 110007

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