Meet Our New Faculty | Bhanu Tanwar
March 21, 2023
We are happy to welcome Ms. Bhanu Tanwar who has joined us this term as Assistant Professor of Law. Prior to joining NLSIU, Bhanu worked as Assistant Professor Law at UPES School of Law where she served as the programme coordinator for a batch of BA LLB students. She taught a specialised course on Forensic Science and the Law and core courses on Law of Evidence and Environmental Law. She has previously worked as an Academic Tutor and TRIP Fellow at Jindal Global Law School, O P Jindal Global University Sonepat, where she assisted senior faculty in conducting classes for undergraduate courses. Her research interest lies in Intellectual Property Rights, Intellectual Property and Access to Medicines, Health Law and Criminal Law.
In this interview, she tells us more about her interests and her work.
Can you tell us more about yourself?
My family hails from Delhi and it is where I was born and brought up. I completed my undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in Law from National Law University, Delhi. I specialised in Business Laws at the Master’s level and wrote my dissertation on ‘Data Exclusivity in Healthcare and Access to Pharmaceutical Products in India’. I then went on to pursue a specialised Masters in Health and Medical Law at Melbourne Law School, University of Melbourne.
My family instilled the importance of education in me from the very childhood. Education indeed has the power to change lives, and bridge social gaps. Since childhood I have been very inquisitive, and as a teenager I loved to question and know more about almost everything around me. My mother has played a major role in motivating me and helping me pursue my hobbies along with my studies.
On the personal front, I like travelling and painting and firmly believe that one can learn so much more about life from the hobbies and extracurricular activities one pursues. I undertook a one-month Thangka painting training workshop at the Thangde Gatsal Art School at Dharamshala and have trekked to the Sunderdhunga and Kafni Glaciers situated in the Kumaon Himalayas.
What are your main areas of interest and teaching? How did your interest in these areas begin?
My main areas of interest are the legal and regulatory aspects of health. My interest in health law particularly began with a seminar elective course on Intellectual Property and Access to Medicines that I took in the final year of my undergraduate law degree at the National Law University, Delhi. This was an eye-opener for me as it helped me critically analyse the intricacies of intellectual property rights and its impact on access to affordable medicines. I went on to further explore the issue relating to the data exclusivity regime and its impact on access to pharmaceutical products in India as part of my LL.M. dissertation.
Apart from being interested in health and medical law, I thoroughly enjoy teaching Law of Evidence and have also previously taught Forensic Science and the Law to undergraduate law students. What is interesting and must be appreciated about the criminal procedure laws is that its very purpose is to do justice not only to the society and the victim, but also to the accused.
Your thoughts on starting your teaching journey at NLS? What are your plans ahead?
I am very excited to be a part of the vibrant NLS community. I believe that there is a lot to learn at NLS and I would like to contribute towards the institution to the best of my abilities. Apart from beginning to teach certain core courses at NLS, I would also like to offer certain electives, particularly on health and medical law.
I also plan to dedicate a major portion of my time to researching certain niche and unexplored areas in the health and medical law sphere. This area of law has specifically gained a lot of prominence during the times of pandemic, but is not just limited to the regulatory and legal issues that arose as a result of the COVID pandemic. Through research, I would like to look at these issues from an Indian perspective and contribute towards the existing scholarship.
Could you highlight some of your key projects or publications?
I co-authored a paper titled “Sustainable Development Through Smart Cities: Issues and Challenges” that was published in Indian Journal on Environmental Protection in September 2022. I am currently working on a paper on the ‘Right to not know’ and another one which analyses the concept of ‘health security’ from a bottoms-up approach by giving due weightage to the interests and contributions of all segments of our society.