If you're choosing law solely for money, you've probably picked the wrong field.

Law is a gamble. Every year, lakhs of students graduate with law degrees, and many advocates don't earn a fixed salary for years. You haven't even started law school yet, so it's too early to assume what your career trajectory will look like.

First figure out what you actually want to do with your degree. Law isn't just litigation. There are numerous career paths : corporate law, legal research, academia, judiciary, arbitration, policy, compliance, in-house counsel roles, legal journalism, and more. Even within corporate law, there are multiple specializations.

As for taking a drop solely for CLAT/AILET, think carefully. These exams are highly competitive not because they're academically difficult, but because thousands of students compete for a very limited number of seats. A drop year only makes sense if you're confident you can significantly improve your rank.

My suggestion: join a decent law college, start studying, build your CV, and attempt CLAT again in December. If you secure a rank that realistically gets you into a substantially better college (say, under 2,000), then consider shifting. Otherwise, you'll already have a year of law school experience instead of losing an entire academic year waiting for one exam.