The Hindu : Plagiarise & perish

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Jul 16, 2002

Opinion

Opinion - Letters to the Editor

Plagiarise & perish

Sir, — We applaud the excellent two-part article by P. Radhakrishnan on the problem of plagiarism (July 7 & 14). Recently, The Times (of London) exposed the plagiarism of the (now ex-) Vice-Chancellor of Australia's largest university. He has lost his powerful position, and has been publicly shamed.

Although we cannot address all the world's wrongs, we have written to The Times with our request to treat the British academia to the same level of scrutiny as that of the Australian. Our words were, in part "will you do the same for your own academics, especially when the crime is more serious, that of literally dining out in international conferences on their knowledge of the third-world, while having pinched this knowledge from those who live there and have actually done the work?

It seems that at these conferences, original research actually "does the rounds,'' and this is the case here, this original research having been used multiple times.

The Indian media has exposed a British academic as having done just that, and despite his own university knowing the details, he continues to enjoy his prestige and position while the academic in India who did all the work, gets nothing but a "two-part write-up in an Indian paper."

We applaud your paper for this exposure, and hope that you serve as an example to others in integrity. Publishing as a whole needs to take plagiarism as seriously as it demands quality scholarship and original research. We would hope that you as a newspaper, and your readers, would also write to British newspapers. We think that sauce for the goose should be sauce for the gander.

Toshi Knell,

Ratifiers for Democracy, NSW, Australia

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