July 16, 2007	Monday	Jamadi-us-Sani 30, 1428

LAHORE, July 15: The first policy on plagiarism will come into force in the country from next month, it is learnt here.

“The Higher Education Commission has been working on the policy since long and its draft will be submitted to the HEC board for approval in its meeting scheduled for the first week of August,” HEC Adviser (quality assurance) Riaz Qureshi told Dawn on Sunday.

He said the draft proposal had recommended that a plagiarist should be given a punishment not less than removal from service, a penalty that no university in the country is practising at present due to absence of any law or policy.

Both teachers and research scholars of all varsities would be asked to ensure before submitting their work for publication that it must not contain any portion of plagiarism, he added.

Besides, those whose publications already contain some part of copying material will be asked to delete the same on their own, otherwise they will face strict action from their respective institution once it is alleged from any quarter and subsequently proved.

In the absence of any law and policy, the higher education institutions have been facing problems in initiating action against the alleged plagiarists. The HEC’s warning to teachers and students that it has `zero tolerance’ against intellectual theft is bearing no fruit either.

Though the Section 66 of the Copy Right Ordinance 1962 says that a plagiarist or a person who knowingly infringes or abets the infringement of copyright is liable to punishment up to three years or a fine of Rs100,000 or both provided the complaint is filed by the author of the work, but it is not being implemented here. No varsity enforces this law on its alleged plagiarist.

The Punjab University had claimed that it could not award heavy penalty to its five plagiarists of Centre for Higher Energy Physics (CHEP) as neither the varsity calendar nor the government legislation provided any legal cover in this regard.

Dr Qureshi said the PU had yet to inform the HEC formally about the penalty it had imposed on the five teachers, including the chairman of CHEP, for plagiarising the work of foreign authors. He said the commission had also asked the PU to report it on the status of another alleged plagiarist of the psychology department by July 26.

He said the commission had already stopped development grants of the PU following its failure to take strict action against the plagiarists. He said the HEC had also sought intervention of Governor Khalid Maqbool, who is chancellor of public sector universities in the province, in the matter and hoped that he would not spare the teachers and research scholars accused of intellectual theft.

Mr Qureshi further informed that at least 15 to 20 cases of plagiarism had surfaced in different varsities and the commission wanted them (universities) to conduct a thorough probe and must go hard on those who proved guilty.

PU registrar Prof Naeem Khan told this reporter that the varsity had already penalised the five faculty members the way the Government College University dealt with the head of economics department. He said the varsity had already briefed the governor on the issue and it was not supposed to inform the HEC in this respect.

He said the varsity had also submitted the case of alleged plagiarist of psychology department to the dean of life sciences for review. However, the registrar claimed that he had been cleared of charges by the first inquiry.

On a question whether the PU is planning to take the HEC to the Council of Common Interest for freezing its development grant, Prof Khan said it had no such intention as it had forwarded the case to the governor for mediation. Earlier, the PU administration had claimed that it would challenge the commission in the CCI for its `arbitrary decision’ of freezing its grant.