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HEC asked varsities to settle Plagiarism cases
LAHORE, Feb 12(Dawn), Feb 10: The Higher Education Commission has directed all public
sector universities to finalise plagiarism cases within three months after
receiving a complaint.
HEC's adviser (quality assurance) Raiz Qureshi
told Dawn on Saturday that the varsities had been asked to complete probe into a
plagiarism case within three months. He said the HEC would consider suspending
funding for the varsities for delaying the process.
He said as many 12
cases of plagiarism of different universities of the country had been surfaced
yet. Only the Government College University had completed the inquiry in one
such case and also initiated action against the plagiarist, he added.
Mr
Qureshi said that the HEC had also sought Governor Khalid Maqbool's intervention
in finalising the case of alleged plagiarism of five faculty members of the
Centre for High Energy Physics, Punjab University. He said the commission had
asked the PU administration several times to finalise inquiry against them but
received no positive response from it so far.
"The HEC is left with no
other option but to request the governor, who is the chancellor of the
provincial public sector universities, to press the PU administration in this
regard," he added.
It is pertinent to mention that the alleged plagiarism
of the CHEP faculty members was surfaced in August last year. The preliminary
inquiry had found them guilty and proposed action against them but the
administration instead of acting upon on them (recommendations) constituted new
committee to probe the matter. This committee also failed to meet its Jan 31
deadline to submit its findings to the authorities concerned. Sources in the
varsity said that close association of one of the alleged plagiarists with the
vice-chancellor was the main reason for delay.
PU registrar Prof Naeem
Khan said the administration had sent a fresh reminder to the inquiry committee
to submit its recommendations at the earliest. To a question, he admitted that
the accused had committed plagiarism according to the preliminary inquiry,
however, no action could be initiated against them without looking into legal
formalities.
The HEC has announced a zero tolerance policy against
plagiarism. The commission has already declared that the names of plagiarists
will be placed on its website once the ongoing plagiarism cases are finalised.
It has already provided policy guidelines on plagiarism by either students or
teachers and warned them that such intellectual theft will not be
tolerated.
A senior academician is of the view that the faculty members
of a department usually know the intellectual theft of their colleagues. He says
if the trend of revealing plagiarism in the faculties picks up, it will open a
Pandora's box.
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| Education News | | Updated: 24 May, 2012 |
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