Ghost Written Dissertations and Fake PhDs

Doctoral research is a sacred work of academic excellence. But for the past many years, many get doctorate degrees for a price. No hard work needed, only good investment of money needed. From topic selection to dissertation submission, there are packages available. One need not read even a single page, he or she need to know the right sources. Often the research guides themselves arrange outsourcing. There are many instances where the research guides themselves undertake the responsibilty of the whole MPhil or PhD work. Besides the contractual amount for preparation of research tools, data collection, data analysis ,drafting the dissertation and the other work, gifts in various forms and gratifying the needs of research guides are a part of the research ritual. Women research scholars often have to deal with the " sexual"demands of the holy professors. Some women scholars who find such demands unbearable drop out.

Plagiarism is quite common among the research fraternity. A senior Professor who found his work copied in a dissertation without any acknowledgement of his name sent a circular to many academics including me accusing of ACADEMIC PIRACY.Times of India,in an article on "Poor Quality Profs?", writes that many doctoral candidates pay 1 to 2 lakh rupees to English teachers to fine tune their dissertations.The article adds that the Internet is teeming with companies that supply anything from 1000- word essays to 10,000-word treatises on any topic. Plagiarism is a serious breach of academic ethics and IF DETECTED degrees can be withheld and even the research scholars can be debarred. But the IF is a very BIG IF. Former AICTE chairman and retired Director of IIT (Madras) Prof.R.Natarajan says that there are only a few PhD holders of true quality today.

PhD degrees are in great demand these days because of the UGC /AICTE requirement of research degrees for higher academic positions with the sole aim of improving the quality of higher education in India. But, AlAS, many ,if not most, of the teachers possess fake PhD degrees. They ,in turn, teach aspiring students.What do they teach ?What can they teach? These are any body's guess.