(13 April 2018) The Indian government recently announced the drafting of a policy, which includes a four-tier system, to penalize researchers engaging in academic plagiarism. This announcement has elicited mixed responses among researchers, some applauding the country’s first attempt to hold researchers accountable for research misconduct, some viewing it skeptically, and some others declaring it inaccurate. The policy is yet to be approved by the Human Resource Development Ministry.
Plagiarism has been identified as a persistent problem in Indian research, but the country had not adopted a systematic approach to tackle it up until now. For the first time, the University Grants Commission of India (UGC), a statutory body that manages higher education, is taking formal steps to regulate the issue.
Editage.com has the description of the four tiers.
