A professor of Jamia Milia Islamia University, who is also a member of the NCTE Council, is at the centre of a controversy over charges of plagiarism for her Ph.D thesis.
Janaki Rajan, who is a professor of education and also a member of the National Council of Teachers Education (NCTE) council, has been charged by officials of the HRD Ministry of reproducing material from a book titled Indian psychology authored by Jadunath Sinha published in 1958.
Rajan had written her thesis on "Cognitive Development in Primary School Children with Particular Reference to the Concepts of Space and Time" in 1991. HRD ministry officials have said that a "substantial part" of her thesis has been copied from Sinha's book.
When contacted, she refuted the charge saying, "of course, it is not true". When pressed about a lot of similarities in her presentation with Sinha's book , she hung up her
phone.
Officials said the bibliography does not mention anywhere Sinha's name which is a clear case of "fraud and plagiarism and copyright violation".
In her declaration, she has said that her thesis is an "original research work".
Officials also contended that Rajan was made a member of NCTE by the previous government bending eligibility criteria.
As a matter of fact, all the four members of NCTE are under the scanner of the Ministry as none of them have been found eligible for the member post, they alleged.
They said that a report would be presented to higher ups in the ministry on which action could be taken against her.
