Plagiarism is a curse that afflicts every endeavour where pen is put to paper — journalism, literature and academic research — but when it shows up in the world of science, the consequences can be far more damaging. At stake are not just individual reputations but the robustness of scholarly findings. That is why every effort must be made to stamp out the rot. It has emerged recently that a paper published in the July 2011 issue of Advanced Materials by eminent scientist and Scientific Adviser to the Prime Minister C.N.R. Rao, S.B. Krupanidhi, a scientist at the Indian Institute of Science, and two students, contained about a dozen lines, including some references, lifted almost verbatim from an April 22, 2010 paper by Surajit Ghosh et al., in Applied Physics Letters. Fortunately, the scale of the infraction did not warrant rejection or retraction, as the plagiarised portions form only a part of the introduction, and description of an equation and do not in any way reduce the significance of the research work. But the scientists' subsequent justification that the verbatim reproduction does not amount to plagiarism but is only an instance of “copying of a few sentences in the text,” and text “overlap” amounts to a disservice to science. The very fact that the journal took cognisance and published their apology is proof enough of the gravity of the transgression.
The U.S. Office of Research Integrity defines plagiarism as “the unattributed verbatim or nearly verbatim copying of sentences and paragraphs which materially mislead the ordinary reader regarding the contributions of the author.” Copying is by far one of the most common forms of academic deception. Students are often the worst offenders, especially in India, due to gross ignorance of what constitutes plagiarism. Hence there is a strong case to teach students the basics of research misconduct, including the correct use of citations, at an early stage of college education, as a comment published recently in Nature points out. In the present case, the lack of such training has unwittingly got senior researchers with a hitherto unblemished publishing record embroiled in controversy. Last year, a magazine editor got into trouble when he used plagiarised inputs provided by a junior colleague for a signed column. One of the ironies of our times is that the computer makes both plagiarism and its detection easier than ever: The internet provides easy and instant access to work from all over the world, but concordance software easily red-flags copying. The end result is that those who cut and paste will be caught.
Keywords: Plagiarism, journalism research, world of science, U.S. Office of Research Integrity, C.N.R. Rao, S.B. Krupanidhi
If number of people are working under you, and they are producing
papers, you automatically becomes a coauthor in our country - like
that almost all the scientists claim, the huge number of papers
produced in their name to further their career and claim eminency.
This is the state in most of our institutions - people holding
simultaneously many posts technical , administrative, managerial are
also no exceptions. In the morning before attending a meeting, they
get briefed about the salient points and life goes on. The real
contributer will be in the background.Honesty and Integrity are the
main things we lack; once we attain a position, we will do anything to
keep that position - Scientists are no exception to this.
CNR Rao is a great great scientist, even greater than Einstein or Pauling. The political situation in India is hampering his growth. We all should be proud of him and worship him rather than criticize him. He is an avatar of Vishnu, who came to save the Indian science. His whole life and his family is sacrificed for the sake of Indian science. His son-in-law is doing outstanding work in the new institute. I don't think anybody in the world who is so devoted to science. We all should do namaskar to his holy feet. I hope he can forgive us for this plagiarism drama and will continue the great work to save Indians.We should have a statue of him in front of all the research institute in India. All the chemistry labs should have a photo of him and people should worship him every day before starting their work.SS bhatnagar award should be renamed as CNR Rao award. The streets in front of the research institutes should name as CNR Rao street. I think even then we will still be indebted to him.
Prof. Rao is known in his close circles(even for his critics) how seriously he contributes to the paper where he is an author. His idea must be there in that paper and also he monitors the progress of the work at every stage. In fact, with his students, he writes almost the whole paper individually on his own style. In this case, the collaboration happened with other reputed researcher, he did not notice the copying happened in the introduction(which would be difficult to identify as thousands of pages are coming out almost every week in the journals. The students/researchers should be inculcated with these values). One should not tarnish one's reputation for one mistake that too he can't be blamed for that fully. In research paper, introduction, to some extent is a review of many others work in the context of your work. In Science, idea is the brain, introduction is like hair. Cutting of the hair can not be equated with cutting of the head. It is unjustified.
It is mandatory that ALL authors in a paper take equal responsibility for a paper. In many scientific institutions regardless of the country, credit is given to the head of the department/institute even if that person has not contributed anything. How will such a person know about what goes into the paper?
A good scientist cannot be judged by the number of papers he publishes or the impact factor or citation index. Scientists suffer from a disease called numerophilia as they have installed 'idola quantitatis' in their scientific shrine.
Senior scientists should set an example by persuading the youngsters to include their names even if they have contributed by way of discussion etc in the 'Acknowledgment' section than accept to be a co author. This calls for scientific honesty and integrity. They will then be a role model for the younger generations.
You come into science because it is your passion not because you get perks by having papers and grants. Science is beyond all these.
@Praveen Chaddah: Forget about making students feel confident that they will get credit. In many cases, students in India are exploited as slaves. When articles are good then all the main credits are robbed by Indian professors for their own benefits and if articles are proved as plagiarized then they hang young students out to dry. In India, many jobs are not given to the right and honest candidates; instead, by selectively recruiting people of inferior intellectuality and by using influence and power Indian professors manage many (incompetent) people to believe that they are doing cutting edge science. This is shocking, unfortunate but true.
Corrupted India will remain forever as a third-world country, if people there forget to be self-critical. Shame on Indian Professors.
We must distinguish between text plagiarism, results plagiarism, and idea plagiarism. One can be corrected easily using software and by teaching students to make word changes, two is a fraud, and idea plagiarism is against IPR and would be covered by patent laws if there were financial implications. As we encourage our students to original thought we must worry most about idea plagiarism. We must respect ourselves and our countryfolk. We get very self-righteous and worked up when an Indian byline is accused of plagiarizing a foreign byline. If we have to make our place in the world of new knowledge, then we must get equally (or more) worked up when a foreign byline is accused of plagiarizing an Indian byline. Young researchers in the emerging bylines of our newer universities must feel confident that they will get credit for the new ideas they originate.
@ Sunil :
What I meant was that the person who wrote the paper, which is usually
the 'first author' (but could be more) should be blamed.
Anyway, what you have written is misguided. It is an unwritten law
that any person who contributed even a slight part of the work done in
the paper has to be included as an author. Look at some of the CERN
papers. They have like 3000(!!!) authors, each having contributed a
small part by working there. You can consult anyone in any of the many
scientific establishments in the country, like IITs, IISc, TIFR etc.
And even if CNR Rao had read the manuscript, is it possible for anyone
who has not written the manuscript to remember each and every sentence
in other papers out there to be able to tell which sentence was copy-
pasted directly ? There are 1000s of papers out there. Now, please
don't suggest that every manuscript he is given to read, he should
enter each and every sentence of that in Google, one at a time, and
see that there are no matches.
When ethics and morality have practically vanished from the land of the Nitishataka and the Hitopadesa, why worry about an aberration here and there? Bhartruhari puts it best, as always...manushya rupena mrigashascharanti.
It would be appalling if senior authors hang young students out to dry — a research paper represents a collective effort and all authors should take responsibility for any mistakes made.Some scientists believe that this unfortunate incident should prompt prolific senior scientists to review the practice of accepting authorship for papers they have not reviewed in detail. If senior scientists don’t have time to review papers, perhaps they should accept only acknowledgement and not full authorship.
An highly corruppted coutry obsessed with bigger-than-life but fake Mahatmas who hardly perform their responsibilities will remain as a third-world country forever if people totally forget to be self-critical. Shame on Indian scientists.
@S Kumar: you are wrong that only the 'first author' of the paper should be blamed. If others claimed the 'authorship' of the paper, this inherently means that they were part of the whole process and hence equably responsible for the output (patents/glory/nobel-prize/plagiarism-charges). If C N Rao did not read the manuscript(as he has claimed to Nature News) and merely 'discussed' the results, he should not be the corresponding author. For this kind of contributions (informal discussions), all scientific journals have a section called 'Acknowledgement' where his contribution could have been acknowledged. As simple as that!!
@vinay kumar :
You misunderstand how people get their names in so many papers. It is
mandatory for the author of a paper to include everyone's name who has
contributed even a small part in the paper. Maybe, the professor had a
lot of students, or a lot of collaborators, not surprising given his
status. It's extremely naive, not to mention impolite, to insinuate that
they are taking credit for other's work.
In many institutions, as one cllmbs the ladder, one's name will appear more often in publications of that research centre, the maximum being reserved namely, for the Director. As a practising scientist (for more than 3 decades), I can say with confidence that it is impossible to publish more than 2 papers a year, if you do the work yourself and if you have 5 students, may be 5 papers per year (maximum). However, it is the norm to add the names of "important" people even if they have contributed nothing - not just in India. I have seen this happening in 'western' countries also.
Sad but true!
CNR Rao's name appears on more than 1800 papers. Most eminent scientists in the west go through a life time with less than a tenth of that number. Taking credit for work done by others is a life time vocation for many of our "eminent" scientists.
It has been rightly pointed out that plagiarism is a curse. In case of Indian education system and when we see Research done in India, it has been seen since a long time that copy-paste has been taught and followed by students and researchers.This also deters innovation and because of that people don't try to find out new solution for the problem. Government and Institutes should make sure that our education and research system is robust to control this problem.
I persued engineering last year and what i feel is our education system mislead the students to plagarize.Our education system try to dig the average student or below average students and due to which the student find the way to decept the system!
1. Choose and appoint one of the authors, capable of undertaking the
issue of plagiarism in copying, in every paper. (note that in some
important journals, like Nature, every author is not involved in
writing). This will bring some relief to the rest of the authors. If
there are 10 authors and 100 relevant papers, which should all 10 check
all 100 papers for copying content!
2. The journals should provide the facility to check the for plagiarism
(software based), if required in a payment basis so that interested
ones can take advantage. (I think if many people uses, the price of
such service can be made really cheap!)
I think we have to take care of our scientists so that more punishment
is not mated out for less offense. In certain issues are discussed in
public domain, few would be competent to comment upon, the rest would
simply join the flow. In this issue, public opinion is not the way.
Lets have an example.
Plagiarism is indeed a worse practice which should should be criticized and condemned across all the domains of the writing. However, I strongly believe that citation of Indian students as worst offenders is not correct as cited by some of my friends on the comments. Some times even the students or say people in general are not even aware of it. Its the system which is in fact responsible for it. Lets take research in India, First motto of research in India is to get published the paper which ultimately leads to the wrong citation of data from other papers.
I think of the following: Just like cheating can be of different
degree, a 1 rupee theft is not equal to 100000 rupee theft, the
plagiarism needs to be classified based on its gravity. Just like cancer
stage 1 and stage 4 have different consequences, plagiarism of certain
nature can be cured. A point to be noted that in the advanced countries
too, the senior authors do not take care of copying of text issue.
However, the junior authors are competent and mature enough to avoid or
hide it. In poorer countries, significance of copying a few lines is
not understood well and some benefit of doubt has to be given for their
intent. In my opinion, when a student become senior, he should be
trusted upon to take care of these things such as plagiarism, and this
is generally what happens. A few of the students do wrong things.
Somebodys son may steal money from his own father, though it is not the
case always. Plagiarism need to be categorized for types.
This is merely a result of the result-based approach of the Indian edeucation system. The students find quick means to complete or write about their research work (considering they have done any) by copying from what influenced them to do the research in the first place. More reprehensible is the fact that many students simply copy and paste such articles and turn them into papers. Higher scrutiny is required. More importantly, the need and the interest in research is required instead of people doing so simply to acquire a degree.
It is sad that these eminent scientists have gotten dragged into this.
Many times (actually, always) the paper itself is not written by the
"head" researcher, but by the student(s) working under them (like
doing their PhD etc). The person writing the paper might be just one,
but the persons whose names are on the paper's author list might be
more. Obviously, not all the authors of the paper verify if each and
every word there in the text is original, nor can it be done. The
remaining authors can at maximum check the paper to see if there is
anything factually incorrect in it.
And, it's especially sad that because of the irresponsibility of the
first author of the paper (who most likely wrote it), the remaining
authors have to suffer from the charges of plagiarism. Only the person
who wrote it should be blamed of plagiarism.
A relevant piece of writing on a cotemporaneous issue, your editorial signals a warning to the 'cut and paste' guys of the cyber world. It is unfortunate that senior researchers are caught in the cobweb of a controversy relating to plagiarism. In the entertainment realm like movies the malgnancy these days is spiralling like a virus, if proliferation of cases is any indication. If excerpts of a text are exacted and adopted verbatim in a pice of writing, it is hailed as a quote. However, if the entire text is reproduced it is condemned as plagiary. This constitutes only a euphemistic ponit of view. All said and done, the tendency to steal the intellectual out put of another man's effort is moral and cultural infraction and as such should be dissuaded. And when the intellectual elite resorts to this, it is really bad. It is heartening that the internet helps cornrering the errant elements easily.
[Researchers and Professors copying data from international research papers and experiments abroad , claiming to be there own , is widely witnessed in our colleges.] And no one notices, since foreign academics don't even bother to look at Indian research, because they know there is no such thing.
[Students are often the worst offenders, especially in India, due to gross ignorance of what constitutes plagiarism.] This is symptomatic of the general lack of any concept of originality in the Indian education system. The majority of undergraduates are dreaming of a career of copying code written by people in Silicon Valley -- many of them Indians who realized that there was not the faintest chance that their creative talents would be understood or valued in their beloved homeland.
This practice is very rampant in the country. Researchers and Professors copying data from international research papers and experiments abroad , claiming to be there own , is widely witnessed in our colleges.The same is being asked by many research scholars from graduation students just to get done with their curriculum prescribed for the year. Immediate check should be put on it, while there should be a set up for scrutiny and review of the papers before they get published.
Plagiarism must be criticized, condemned and banned not only because it
misleads the readers about the identity of the authors it also
denigrates the entire fraternity of literature, science and education
as whole. It assaults the essence of education. Education is about
learning new ideas, formulating innovations. plagiarism will kill not
only the creativity of the minds rather it will block the possibilities
of novelty in scientific sky. Come on please! For fine brains there is
no dearth of undiscovered discoveries.
" Great are not those who work on formula rather greats are those who
work-out formula."
Prof. C. N. R. Rao works as a scientific adviser to the PM, and still has time to perform research and publish papers! Or is it so? It is not that some student copied and pasted somebody else's research that should be viewed as serious. More serious is that "eminent scientists" become money managers and just because they bring in the money, require their names to be included as authors in the papers, when they don't even know what the title of the paper is, let alone its contents. The definition of academic dishonesty must be broadened to include those that gain "eminent scientist" status by publishing papers without even lifting a finger! Academic honesty must start at the top. Prof. Rao must introspect if he deserves his name to be included in the paper, just because he provided the money and the materials for the research, when all the hard work is done by the students and possibly their immediate advisers like Krupanidhi. Most appropriate place for his name is in acknowledgments.
I cannot agree more with the author. However, one thing I disagree with is the time at which we need to educate our children about intigrity. This does not pertian to research alone. Our rote learning methods encourage plagiarism. An early start to avoid plagiarism, im my opinion, can even lead to better understanding of the subjects we learn and creativity. I hope right steps are taken towards this move.
Your observation that students are often the worst offenders, especially in India, due to gross ignorance of what constitutes plagiarism; hence there is a strong case to teach students the basics of research misconduct, is well founded. But often teachers themselves are guilty. Particular instances of plagiarism come to light only when the individuals involved are high profile. India is very weak in working against plagiarism.
The Sunday magazine of The Hindu had carried my article Plagiarise or perish on July 7 and 14, 2002; and published an important feedback from Ratifiers for Democracy, NSW, Australia, on July 16, 2002. On October 26, 2009 the Outlook weekly carried a column, What Caste Is A Nobel? by Neelabh Mishra, a part of which was lifted from my interview to the rediff.com published on October 12, 2009. Though I brought this to the notice of the Outlook editor, Vinod Mehta, nothing happened. As plagiarism is pervasive in journalism and social sciences it is important to have adequate debate in the media to minimize this evil.
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