A Memorandum of Understanding to establish Mr. M. K. Nambyar SAARCLAW Centre for Advanced Legal Studies was signed by Mr.K.K.Venugopal, Senior Advocate, Supreme Court of India and Prof. Ranbir Singh, Vice-Chancellor, NALSAR on 18th October, 2003.

Hon'ble Chief Justice of India Mr. V.N. Khare laid the foundation stone for the building of M.K. Nambyar SAARCLAW Centre at NALSAR University of Law, Shameerpet, Hyderabad on February 7th, 2004. Hon'ble Mr. Justice P Venkatarama Reddi, Judge, Supreme Court of India, Hon'ble Justice Dr. AR. Lakshmanan, Judge, Supreme Court of India, Hon'ble Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh, Mr. N. Chandra Babu Naidu, Hon'ble Chief Justice of Andhra Pradesh, Mr. Devinder Gupta and other Hon'ble Judges of Andhra Pradesh High Court and Members of Legal fraternity graced the occasion

The generous donation so given has been utilized by the University to construct the M.K.Nambyar SAARCLAW Centre for Advanced Legal Studies Building and also to install state-of-the-art Video-Conferencing facility besides instituting a Professorial Chair ‘The M.K.Nambyar SAARCLAW Chair on Comparative Constitutional Law’.

In 1947 Mr. Nambyar came to Madras and set up practice in the Madras High Court. Mr. Nambyar had a scholastic bent of mind. He used to make very thorough and intensive preparation of cases before he presented them before the Court. He was associated with several leading Constitutional cases. Notable cases which he argued in which important principles of Constitutional Jurisprudence were laid down included, the Gopalan Case, Kerala Agrarian Reforms case, Kerala Education Bill case, the Privy Purse case, the Golaknath case, Bank Nationalisation case, the Express Newspapers case etc. His argument always assisted the court in interpreting important constitutional provisions particularly in respect of Fundamental Rights.

Speaking at a Full Court meeting to moan the demise of Mr. M. K. Nambyar the then Chief Justice of India, Hon'ble Justice A.N.Ray spoke, "He belonged to that school of lawyers who were guided by dignity and discipline in professional life. He always wanted to rectify his knowledge by reading matters, which would enliven law. He was a lawyer whose arguments struck balance between rigidity on the one hand and formlessness on the other. Sir Rash Behari Ghosh at the conclusion of his Tagore Lectures compared a lawyer to “poor player that struts and bets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more”. Sir Rash Behari said so because of his humility. Men of character of the type of Nambyar will be remembered by the Bench and Bar for years to come.

A popular member of the Profession and a person known for his affable temperament, Mr. Nambyar was the author of several articles on Constitutional Law.

Mr. Venugopal's life as an Advocate began in January 1954 in the High Court of Mysore with his father as his Senior. It was in 1972 that the Supreme Court itself designated him a Senior Advocate. In 1979, the Janata government appointed him as the Additional Solicitor General of India. In recent times he appeared for important cases such as the Mandal case, the dispute concerning Ayodhya, the Presidential Reference regarding appointment of Judges, the case against the appointment of Ms. Jayalalithaa as the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, the Presidential Reference regarding the Gujarat Elections in 2002 and more recently, the cases regarding Minority Educational Institutions.

Mr. Venugopal was elected as the President of the Supreme Court Bar Association on several occasions and is also active in the working of several Bar Associations, both in India and abroad. In 1984, he was honoured by the American Bar Association (ABA) conferring on him its Honorary Membership. He was also elected as the President of the International Association of Lawyers based in Paris in 1996 and spent considerable part of 1996-97 looking after the organization from its Paris headquarters. During the period 1995-97 he was elected President of SAARCLAW, which is an organization of the Advocates in the SAARC countries. He has been conferred upon many national honours, including Padma Bhushan.

He is a Member of the Academic Council of the National Law School of India University, Bangalore. He is also a Member of the Executive Council of the West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences. In memory of his father, the M.K. Nambyar Chair in Constitutional Law has been setup at the National Law School, Bangalore.

He has written and delivered lectures on a variety of subjects within the law, particularly in the area of Constitutional Law. He is a widely traveled person and his interests are writing, reading, collecting antique books, arts and photography.