Cases of misconduct investigated by SSV

See Also: Activities

 

NEW CASES

 2009 

(i).On the basis of further information available with SSV, after in depth analysis of Dr. Babbar's case, it is once again concluded that there is only a mild recycling of the contents from one of his papers to another. The later published in a Conference Proceedings, according to Dr. Babbar, was neither communicated nor presented by him. The same be posted on the SSV website. 

(ii)The alleged scientific misconduct and plagiarisation of the papers of his predecessor by Prof Dyanand Dongaonkar , Secretary General , Association of Indian Universities has been  investigated and verified. Prof Dongaonkar and all members of the Executive Council of AIU have been requested to give their comments. However, despite two reminders,SSV has not heard anything. The EC decided to post this case on the website.

(iii) Mr Rait ,  a PhD student of  the Electronics Department of the South Delhi Campus of  DU,  being guided  by Profs  Bhatnagar, P C Mathur and Sengupta has published the same  research  paper  twice with different titles in two  different international journals,  The President reported that SSV has brought this serious case of plagiarism twice   to the attention of  Prof Deepak  Pental, VC of DU , Prof Dinesh Singh, the   Director of South Delhi Campus of DU, Prof Verma , the Head of the Electronics Department and the supervisors of the student. None of these academics has responded, inquired into, or take any action on this very clear case of plagiarism by a Ph D student who was on the verge of getting his Ph.D. from the University. The EC decided that this case be posted on SSV website.   

(iv).EC decided that  the  cases of  (a) complaints of biased editors   by Profs Karmeshu of JNU, and Sitaramam , (b) plagiarisation by Profs Krishnan  and Selladurai which  have been verified   be posted on the SSV website.

2008

1. Kouvatsos and Assi (UK) case : In January 2008, Prof. Karmeshu a former EC member of SSV and a Bhatnagar award winning scientist from the School of Computer and Systems Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, reported the case of suspected plagiarism of his research paper by Prof. Kouvatsos and Assi from the Department of Computing, School of Informatics, University of Bradford, UK. The paper by Karmeshu and Shachi Sharma titled "Long Tail Behavior of Queue Lengths in Broadband Networks: Tsallis Entropy Framework" was submitted to the journal Performance Evaluation in July 2005 (PEVA05 paper). This paper was rejected after about 14 months, but later they found that substantial portions of their PEVA05 paper have been published in another paper titled "On the Analysis of Queues with Long Range Dependent Traffic: An Extended Maximum Entropy Approach" by Kouvatsos and Assi in "IEEE Proceedings, Conference on Next Generation Internet Networks, 3rd EuroNGI Conference, 21-23 May 2007" (IEEE07 paper). The IEEE07 paper by Kouvatsos and Assi contained atleast 23 instances identical in language, equations and graphs with those of the PEVA05 paper. Also, 11 out of 17 references cited by Kouvatsos and Assi were the same as in the PEVA05 paper. Following Prof. Karmeshu's complaint, the Chief Editor of PEVA, Dr. Werner Bux, confirmed that Dr. Kouvatsos was indeed one of the referees of the PEVA05 and that his conduct as a referee was found unworthy and unacceptable and dropped him as a referee for the journal with immediate effect. Karmeshu and Shachi Sharma also reported the matter to IEEE, which had published the paper by Kouvatsos and Assi. This matter has been referred to the Manager Intellectual Property Rights, IEEE and is under their consideration. They have also reported the matter and findings of Dr. Bux to the Vice Chancellor, University of Bradford, UK where Dr. Kouvatsos works as Professor in Department of Computing, School of Informatics.

2007

1. Kundu et al, NCCS-DBT: This case of misrepresentation of data in two JBC publications by Dr. Kundu and his students, as established by SSV, has received a very wide coverage in the media. The 2 nd paper published in JBC has been withdrawn by the journal. Detailed report of the case is available on our website. SSV's responded to the debate in Current Science through a communication titled “Probing Misconduct-Role of SSV” that appeared in the Aug 25, 2007 issue of Current Science. Despite all our efforts, NCCS and DBT have not taken any punitive action so far. Click here for more details

2. Atiyah-Raju Case: Prof C.K. Raju charged Prof Michel Atiyah, former President of the Royal Society, UK, of plagiarizing or claiming inappropriate credit to some of his previously published ideas. After ascertaining from 3 independent experts that the complaint is valid, SSV contacted Dr. Atiyah for his views. Atiyah wrote to SSV that while he has not published anything on the subject under question, he has indeed lectured on the subject without being aware of Raju's publications. Now that he is aware of them, he assured that he would certainly cite them if and when he publishes something on the subject. In the light of the responses from Dr. Atiyah and the counter-response of Dr. Raju, establishing a prima-facie case, it was decided to place the response of both sides on the SSV website.

3. Khanuja-CIMAP: Besides being a coauthor of most publications and patents originating from CIMAP of which he is the Director, some of the publications of Dr. Khanuja are plagiarized. SSV has confirmed the charges. Dr Khanuja was expected to retire voluntarily, as was also confirmed by the Minister, S&T. Regrettably, the CSIR has given him extension for two years despite our pointing out his misconduct. SSV will continue to put moral pressure on CSIR to remove the Director.

4. Selladurai et al, Anna Univ.: Prof Selladurai and his students of Anna University have plagiarized a paper in an international journal. SSV has verified plagiarism. Prof Selladurai has pleaded ignorance about the paper, apologized to SSV and has written to the journal for withdrawing the paper. The PDF (Dr Muthukumaran) who apparently submitted the paper has been asked to explain, but no reply has been received so far. SSV will write to the VC of Anna univ for suitable action.

5. Ranjit Singh-NSIT: Prof Ranjit Singh (Director NSIT) and colleagues have plagiarised several papers, which has been verified to be true by SSV. Prof singh has not responded to the charges. The Chairman, BOG of NSIT has agreed to conduct an enquiry into the case.

6. Kumar-NERIST: Prof Kumar, Director, NERIST has plagiarized some papers which has been verified by SSV. Prof Kumar has not responded to the charges. The Chairman, BOG has been approached and a judicial enquiry has been ordered by the authorities.

7. Banerjee-NIPER: Dr U Banerjee, NIPER, Chandigarh has plagiarised numerous publications. After verification, the Chairman, BoG of NIPER was informed since we did not hear any response from Banerjee. The Chairman (Dr R.A. Mashelkar) set up an enquiry committee on our complaint. The committee has given a report. But, the Chairman has not yet decided the future course of action.

8. J.S. Singh BHU: Dr J.S. Singh of BHU has plagiarized a paper of a professor J.S. Singh of the same department. The case has been referred to the Rector, BHU who has verified plagiarism and has promised suitable action, though nothing has happened so far.

9. Ahmed Cochin Univ: Prof Ahmed, former VC of Cochin Univ of Technology has been charged with obtaining his D.Sc. by recycling the data from the Ph.D. theses of his former students. We have received no response to our queries from Prof Ahmed. Regrettably, he has now been appointed the VC of AMU by MHRD.

10. Vankar, IITK: Dr. Padma Vankar of IITK has been charged by the Pesticdes Manufacturers and Formulators Association of India with manipulation of pesticide data. Vankar was earlier involved in a plagiarism case, which SSV investigated and verified the charges. The Director, IITK investigated the case but did not take any action. In the present case, since PMFAI has initiated a legal action against Vankar and IITK, SSV will not proceed any further.

11. Mashelkar: The highly publicized case of plagiarism involving the Mashelkar committee on patents, as well as Mashelkar's book on IPR has been discussed. Dr. Mashelkar responded to the SSV query admitting the charges, tendering unconditional apology and describing the corrective steps that he has taken.
    Click here for the full text of his letter.

2005-2006

1. Our report on plagiarisation of three papers by two CEERI scientists has been accepted by CSIR. Action has been taken in one case and inquiry continues in the other case.

2. Plagiarisation by a faculty member of Moradabad Institute of Technology has been brought to the attention of the concerned Director but no action has been taken by the management

3. Cases of plagiarisation by two faculty members of Delhi University were looked into. The University, on its own, took a serious view of it and has taken disciplinary action
   
   
4. An unethical case of multiple publication by some NPL scientists has been examined and refered to NPL director for further action.

5. A case of harassment of Prof. V. Sitaramam, a senior faculty member of Pune University by the Vice-Chancellor, Prof. A.S. Kolaskar, in the submission of a research proposal for funding to UGC has been established. An open letter has been sent to VCs of major universities for liberalization of procedures . The Letter has had a very favourable and appreciative response from many academic and R&D institutions.

6. A case of plagiarisation of data in a PhD thesis of a candidate in IIT Delhi has been examined. The IITD has already inquired into the case.
   

7. A case of falsification of an academic degree by an ex-VC of a state university in Kolkata has been examined. The case has been highlighted in the local media. Because of political and legal ramifications, the SSV has not proceeded further.

2003-2004

1. CEERI Pilani Case : Dr. S.S. Agarwal (recently retired as Director Grade scientist), Dr. Abdul Mobin, Drs. A.K. Mishra and Zahid Ali have been found guilty of publishing three papers of considerable importance plagiarized from US journals. The DG, CSIR was requested to take suitable action. After our several reminders and lengthy enquiry by CSIR, it has agreed with our conclusions. Dr. Agarwal has since been relieved of his Emeritus assignment with CSIR. The other authors have yet to be punished even after 6 months
   
   
2. Tanta Univesity Case : Prof. Laila Rashid, Department of Mathematics, Tanta University, Egypt has published several plagiarised papers in various international (US, Italy , Netherland , Romania , Czech) journals, including Indian J. of Pure and Applied Mathematics, published by INSA. The complainant, a Prof. from USA , having failed to get any response from INSA, requested SSV to take up the case. The SSV verified the case. Prof. Rashid has already been blacklisted by one international journal and her papers have been withdrawn. We have requested INSA to take a similar action. We are still awaiting response from INSA editor
   
   
3. Drs. Rashmi Mishra and Sapna Johnson, Centre for Science & Environment, New Delhi & Padma Vankar, FEAT, Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur: Rashmi Mishra et al have submitted a paper " Analysis of Pesticide Residues in Fruits and Vegetables from different Mandis of Delhi " to J Analytical-Science for publication. This paper has been largely plagiarized from a paper " Monitoring of Pesticide Residues in Summer Fruits and Vegetables from Kanpur" published in Bulletin Environmental Contamination and Toxicology by Dr R Sanghi and Dr V. Tewari of Facility for Ecological and Analytical Testing ( FEAT), IIT, Kanpur. The SSV has examined the two papers and have verified that Rasmi Mishra et al have not only plagiarised the paper extensively but have also made false claims. The SSV has written to Dr Sunita Narayan , Director, Centre for Science & Environment and Prof. S G Dhande, Director , IIT, Kanpur to seek their comments and to urge them to take appropriate disciplinary actions against their respective colleagues, if called for. Dr Narayan has informed that Dr. Vankar did not seek permission of her two colleagues in the Centre to be the co-authors of the paper. Nevertheless , she has taken steps to see that such a thing is not repeated . What these steps are and how Dr. Padma Vankar, who is also a Consultant to the Centre for Science and Environment, is affected, has not been clarified. On the other hand, Prof Dhande has not bothered to respond, despite reminders. We, however, understand that Prof. Dhande set up an Enquiry Committee, the report of which is with him for over two months. The SSV is very concerned that an Institute of national importance is not prepared to face the reality of a scientific fraud committed by a scientist of the institute and to take suitable action as a deterrent for such unethical practices. Having exhausted our moral power of persuasion, this case is being brought to the attention of the Chairman, BOG, IIT Kanpur, Minister, MHRD and is also being put on our Web page (www.scientificvalues.org). We hope the institutions concerned will deem it important to have researchers imbibe ethics and values in the pursuit of science and technology.

2002 and earlier

1. Professor V S Rajput, Kumaon Univ: Prof. Kavita Pandey , Head, Physics Department, Kumaon University brought to the attention of SSV, and a number of prominent particle physicists in India and abroad that Prof Rajput, a former Head of the same department and presently serving as the Vice Chancellor of the University, in co-authorship with his research students have indulged in serious unethical practices of plagiarization of published research papers of others, as also of publishing same/similar papers in more than one journal. The SSV examined the published papers in question, and sought information/ clarification from both Prof. Pandey and Prof. Rajput. Prof. Rajput maintains that his former research student and his co-author has plagiarized the paper and has put his name on the paper without his permission. Merit of this argument apart, as the VC, Prof. Rajput has taken no disciplinary action so far against his former student and presently his faculty member of the University. Having confirmed this serious case of plagiarism and unethical practices, as has also been done by several other prominent Particle Physicists in India and abroad, the SSV has written to the President of India, the Governor of Uttaranchal ( who is the Chancellor of the University), Minister, MHRD, and the Chairman, UGC, urging them to take a strict disciplinary action against Prof. Rajput. After considerable moral pressure by a number of scientists world over, the Chancellor has now set up an enquiry committee under the Chair of a retired Judge. The SSV feels strongly that prominent scientists in the field best judge scientific unethical practices and thus their verdict should be taken seriously for taking an appropriate action. We hope that a decision to refer such a case to a retired Judge does not meet the usual fate of a long enquiry, ultimately resulting in diluting the seriousness of such a case.