PU professor forcibly retired for plagiarism

Dr Mahmood charged with plagiarism after detailed discussion at 706th meeting of Syndicate.

LAHORE:

Professor Dr Zaid Mahmood of Punjab University’s Institute of Chemistry was forced to retire by the PU Syndicate, under the Punjab Employees Efficiency, Discipline and Accountability Act, on Saturday for plagiarism.   

Dr Mahmood was charged with plagiarism after a detailed discussion at the 1706th meeting of the Syndicate. It was presided over by PU Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Mujahid Kamran.

In 2011, a professor of the Institute of Chemistry had filed a complaint against Dr Mahmood alleging that he had plagiarised some of his research articles. An inquiry committee comprising Lahore College for Women University’s Department of Chemistry Chairperson Dr Bushra Khan, Director of Public Instructions (Colleges) Dr Jaleel and former PU additional registrar Prof Dr Aurangzeb Alamgir compared the original sources with Dr Mahmood’s research papers and concluded that most of the papers had been plagiarised.

Plagiarism had been a hot topic of discussion at the Syndicate’s last five meetings.

At the 1705th meeting, the Syndicate decided to serve a show-cause notice to Dr Mahmood under the PEEDA Act and award him an opportunity to be present at the next meeting.

Dr Mahmood appeared before the Syndicate in person but failed to defend himself. After analysing the records, the Syndicate found that Dr Mahmood had plagiarised his research articles and decided to penalise him with forced retirement.

The Syndicate also granted ex-post facto approval to the Independent Disciplinary Committee, constituted in 2010.

The committee was constituted to hear appeals against decisions taken by the Unfair Means Cases Committee.

The Syndicate also granted ex-post facto permission for the re-consideration of an appeal by Syed Abdul Qadir Gillani requesting the restoration of his BA result that had been “quashed in an unfair mean case”.

The Syndicate approved a new inquiry into Gillani’s case to review other allegations. Interestingly, Dr Mahmood is the petitioner in the case against Gillani. The Anti-Corruption Department is probing the case and has summoned VC Dr Mujhaid Kamran on March 31. “The professor has been made to retire in order to save the skin of those who awarded Gillani a fake degree.

The administration has reopened an inquiry into the fake degree case after seven years and will now tell the Anti-Corruption Department that they are probing the case themselves,” an official of the PU administration, requesting anonymity, said.

The Syndicate also approved the proceedings of the Academic Council and Finance and Planning Committee.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 30^th, 2014.