Plagiarism complaint in PhD thesis lands researcher, supervisor in soup

Harinder Singh Khaira

Patiala, May 9

Levelling serious allegations of deteriorating academic level at Punjabi University, Patiala, a complaint of plagiarism in the PhD thesis has raised fingers over the researcher and his supervisor.

The complainant alleged that a major part of the thesis on the topic “Changing Trends in Contemporary Hindi Cinema” has been copied from various sources, including Wikipedia. The thesis has been recently submitted by Kanwaljit Singh, who is currently working as a producer in the Centre for Advanced Media Studies (CAMS).

Though riding on the testimony of the software recommended by the UGC to check plagiarism, the supervisor has given a clean chit to the thesis. But the norms also state that the software-generated report could not be taken for granted and human judgement is needed to determine the copying.

As per the university policy on plagiarism, paraphrasing of another’s work by simply changing a few words or altering the order of presentation without clear identification, appropriate reference and acknowledgement is also one of its forms.

The complaint has systematically highlighted all anomalies in the thesis and submitted a complaint with the administrative officials, including the Vice-Chancellor and the Registrar.

It is also alleged that the researcher copied the major share of multiple articles related to his topic from various sources. It is also a violation of guidelines of the institution, which reads, “The overall similarity index, excluding bibliography/references, must be around permissible limit or less with not more than 5 per cent similarity from one particular source.”

It is said that the researcher used an entire online article, “Emerging trends in Contemporary Indian (Bollywood) Cinema”, by changing a few words in the same language in his introduction topic of the thesis. The complainant has enclosed the list of several articles that have been used on the same pattern in the thesis.

Meanwhile, supervisor Gurmeet Singh Maan has given his clarification on the issue to the authorities along with the report of plagiarism-detecting software. The clarification report stated that the software has generated 21 per cent plagiarism, which is below the prescribed limit that is capped at 30 per cent for humanities stream.

Gurmeet Singh Maan said: “The research work of Kanwaljit Singh is authentic and the report of detecting software is also under the permissible limit. If there is any fault in the detecting software, we are not responsible of the technical glitches.”

Meanwhile, researcher Kanwaljit Singh could not be contacted despite repeated attempts.

Additional Dean Research Rakesh Mohan Sharma said it is the responsibility of the supervisor to check the thesis according to the norms of the university and the UGC.

“The supervisor has submitted his report and as per the process, now the thesis will be checked by the committee that could also reject it,” Sharma said.