Being a legal reporter for about five years, I find it exciting when deputies in various industries are eager to share their views on judicial issues during the annual legislative and consultative meetings.

"I am glad to see our country improving the quality of lawmaking and accelerating judicial reform in the past few years, especially after the leadership raised the importance of the rule of law in October," said Ke Jun, Party chief of Tianmen, Hubei province and an NPC deputy.

He said he has often heard people complain about the difficulty in dealing with government departments as the officials sometimes do not handle administrative affairs in accordance with law.

Judicial reform is a social issue that requires effort from every walk of life, he said.

"The rule of law is not only work for our legislators and judicial experts, but also for the public. The improvement of law requires contributions from more people, though some of us are not professionals," he said.

"In the past, I often thought laws were none of my business, but now I've realized they are helpful to my work, so I started to learn about them. The more people enhance their legal awareness, the faster, I think, a society based on rule of law can be created," he added.

Zhang Qiong, another deputy from Hubei, said the problem of handling matters through "connections" will be alleviated if more people abide by rules.

Although the deputy specializes in health, she said that she also takes notice of legal news, especially after the leadership started judicial reform in 2013 and highlighted the role of the rule of law last year.

"Obeying rules of our own industries is an embodiment of the rule of law. When each industry, which can be taken as a single cell of the country, is ruled by law, the nation will be gradually regulated," she added.

Tian Rubin, a deputy and an entrepreneur from Hunan province, makes the law a priority in his agricultural businesses, saying a better legal environment is important for an enterprise to compete in the market.

"It could be a hassle when I registered a business license or applied for an investment project in some administrations before, because their review process cost too much time and often charged ridiculous fees," Tian said.

The administrators did not think their behaviors had disobeyed laws, even though they hindered the development of companies and caused disorder in the market, he added.

Sun Yuqiu, a college principal from Hubei, said that the rule of law has also been highlighted in education. "Teachers who make use of their posts to 'help' others with enrollment will be punished under our rules," she added.