Daily Times

The Higher Education Commission (HEC) officials on Tuesday informed the Senate Sub-committee on Federal Education and Professional Training about penalties imposed to curb plagiarism.

The meeting of the Sub Committee of Senate Standing Committee on Federal Education and Professional Training was held here under the convenorship of Senator Rana Maqbool Ahmad here at PIPS hall, Parliament Lodges.

At the start of the meeting, the Committee took up the issue of a student of Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) Australia, who alleged that, his thesis paper has been stolen by the Vice Chancellor of Khawaja Farid University.

The HEC officials informed that a Committee has been set up to examine the issue in hand and its meeting is scheduled to be held on January 3, 2022 and will submit its report to the Senate committee in the next 15 days.

The Committee was briefed by HEC officials about the mechanism followed in checking plagiarism. The Officials also updated the committee about penalties imposed to curb plagiarism.

The severity of the penalty is directly proportional to the ratio of plagiarism in the Research Journal or thesis paper, they added.

The Committee was informed by the Vice Chancellor of University of Balochistan (UOB) that the plagiarism policy commenced in UOB in 2007 and the management of the university has faced three cases of plagiarism so far.

The Vice Chancellor deals only with the plagiarism of students and faculty members and the research journals directly came under the domain of the HEC.

The Committee sought details of plagiarism found in research journals and also directed the HEC to collect details of plagiarism of students and faculty members from universities.

The Convener of the Committee Senator Rana Maqbool Ahmad said that this is an intellectual dishonestly and HEC should deal strictly with whoever is involved in this crime.

The meeting was attended by, Senator Fawzia Arshad, Parliamentary Secretary for Education, HEC officials and Vice Chancellors of various universities.