Three cases of fake PhD thesis reported, two involved VCs: HRD

The University Grants Commission has found three cases of plagiarism in writing PhD thesis, including two involving vice chancellors of different universities, in the past three years, the government told Parliament today.

The information was shared by Minister of State for Human Resource Development Satya Pal Singh in response to a written question in Rajya Sabha.

"The UGC has informed that three cases have come to their notice in last three years against Chandra Krishnamurthy, vice chancellor of Pondicherry University (2015); Anil Kumar Upadhyay, reader of Mahatma Gandhi Kashi Vidyapeeth, Varanasi (2017); and Vinay Kumar Pathak, vice chancellor of Dr APJ Abdul Kalam Technical University, Lucknow (2018)," Singh said.

The minister informed that Chandra Krishnamurthy was dismissed from the post in July 2016, and the other two universities have been asked to take action against the two persons.

With a view to check plagiarism in higher education, UGC has notified the Promotion of Academic Integrity and Prevention of Plagiarism in Higher Educational Institutions Regulations, 2018.

"The objective of the regulations is to promote academic research and curb plagiarism by developing systems to detect it," he added.