UGC Introduces Compulsory ‘Research & Publication Ethics’ Prog For PhD Scholars

New Delhi: To check plagiarism and improve the quality of research work, the University Grants Commission (UGC) has introduced two credit courses for PhD scholars at the pre-registration stage.

The courses titled ‘Research and Publication Ethics’ will be made mandatory for the students during the six-month pre-registration phase and subjects will be introduced from the coming academic session, said a UGC communication sent to all the university vice-chancellors on Thursday.

The courses will be of 30 hours duration each and cover interested faculties as well. At a later stage, the courses will be offered at the PG level.

“The quality of research papers produced in India is not good, and we are aware of that. There are complaints of plagiarism as well, which is why we now want to teach students the ethics of publication so that such complaints can be avoided,” UGC secretary Rajnish Jain was quoted by media as saying.

The move is part of UGC’s set of initiatives to contain inferior research work, check plagiarism and encourage quality-based research work in the country.

Recently, it had issued a new list of journals for publication of research work. The commission had made it clear that only studies published in these journals will be taken into consideration during the hiring process.

As per reports, more than 40 per cent of research work gets published in fair journals across disciplines.