PLAGIARISM IN LEGAL RESEARCH:

WHY SHOULD WE CARE?

Dr. Subhradipta Sarkar
Associate Professor,
Faculty of Law, Jamia Millia Islamia
 What is Plagiarism?
• The word “plagiarism” is derived from the
Latin term “plagiare”. This means to kidnap or
abduct. Plagiarize is copy another person’s
idea, words or works and pretend that they
are your own.

• Plagiarism is one of the most severe

violations of academic writing. It may have
serious consequences for a student or a
teacher or a research scholar even to the
extent of expulsion from college/ University.
 What is plagiarism?
• Submitting someone’s work as their own.
• Re-writing someone’s work without
properly citing sources.
• Using quotations, but not citing the
source.
• Citing some, but not all passages that
should be cited.
 What is plagiarism?

• Providing proper citations, but fails to

change the structure and wording of the
borrowed ideas enough.
• Inaccurately citing the source.
• Relying too heavily on other people’s
work.
• Fails to bring original thought into the
text.
Examples of Plagiarism
 Common Excuses
Everyone does it!

It’s okay if
I don’t get caught!

I have referred my previous work only!

This assignment Is it a plagiarism?
was BORING!

I didn’t
My supervisor copy the
whole text My parents
expects expect “A”s!
too much!

It was due to
My co-author/s
mistake
did it!
Only!
 How to avoid Plagiarism
• Manage your time and plan your work – ensure that
you have enough time to prepare, read and write.
• In your notes, highlight in color/bold any direct
quotations you want to use in your assignment - this
will help to ensure you use quotation marks with an
appropriate reference when you are writing up your
work.
• Allow enough time to check your final draft for
possible referencing errors or omissions.
• Save all your notes, files, printouts and so on until
you complete your work.
• Scan your work through plagiarism checker
software.
How to avoid Plagiarism

Cutting and pasting from the Internet

without clear acknowledgement
It is important to evaluate carefully all
material found on the Internet, as it is less
likely to have been through the same process
of scholarly peer review as published sources.
 How to avoid Plagiarism
• Correct Citation should be used
• A “citation” is the way you tell your readers that certain
material in your work came from another source. It also gives
your readers the information necessary to find that source
again, including:
• the name of the author
• the title of the work
• the name of the source – Book, Journal, Report, etc.
• the date and other details of the sources – Vol., Issue, Date
• the page numbers of the material you are borrowing
 How to avoid Plagiarism.
Why should I cite sources?
• Giving credit to the original author by citing
sources is the only way to use other people’s
work without plagiarizing.
• Citations are extremely helpful to anyone
who wants to find out more about your ideas
and where they came from.
• Citing sources shows the amount of research
you’ve done.
• Citing sources strengthens your work by
lending outside support to your ideas.
 How to avoid Plagiarism.
Know how to Paraphrase:
• A paraphrase is a restatement in your own words of
someone else’s ideas. Changing a few words of the
original sentences does NOT make your writing a
legitimate paraphrase.
• You should keep in mind that paraphrased passages
still require citation.
 Anti-Plagiarism Softwares
• Open source Softwares:
1. Viper
2. PlagScan
3. Plagiarisma
4. PlagTracker
• Commercial Softwares :
1. Turnitin
2. Urkund
3. PlagiarismDetect
4. Unplag
Consequences of plagiarism
• Academic Dishonesty
• Unethical
• Can be barred from guiding any research degree
• Promotion can be stopped.
• Can be demoted to lower post, grade/scale.
• No increments for certain period.
• Termination from service
• Legal action as per Copyright Act.
Law on Plagiarism: Copyright Infringement
and Plagiarism
• UGC contemplating a new law.
• Indian Copyright Act, 1957
• Sec. 14: Meaning of Copyright: Protection of literary
work (e.g. books) by disallowing their unauthorized
reproduction, adaptation and translation.
• Violation of copyright is a legal wrong
• Sec. 57: grants authors the “Special Right” to be
attributed for their work
• Sec. 63: Infringement as a criminal offence - six
months to three years imprisonment and with fine of
Rs. 50k – 2 lakh. Special reasons if below the min.
punishment
 Copyright Infringement v. Plagiarism
• Legal Right • Moral Right
• Temporary – 60 years • Perpetual
from the death of the
author

Both may occur simultaneously (exact reproduction) or

Infringement without plagiarism (substantial
reproduction of a copyrighted work with
acknowledgement to author)
 Cases of Plagiarism
• Indian Institute of Management v. Ukakant Shrivastva
(2001)
The Respondent filed the petition under Art. 226 of the
Constitution of India against the order of termination
of his services.
The respondent was Professor in the Indian Institute
of Management, Ahmedabad. His services were
terminated on the ground of plagiarism.
This was found by a student of IIM who noticed that
the respondent along with two other scholars authored
a book where they copied verbatim from books of
other authors.
He reported the matter and the chain of events
followed.
 Cases of Plagiarism
• In October 2002, seven Stanford University physicists, three
of them Nobel laureates, wrote an unusual letter to then
President A P J Abdul Kalam. In it, they called attention to a
number of instances of blatant plagiarism by B S Rajput, a
physicist and then vice-chancellor of Kumaon University
(Uttarakhand), and expressed shock that his actions had gone
unpunished despite conclusive evidence of wrongdoing:
• The communication by the Stanford physicists was followed
by a national-level campaign to highlight the wrongdoings of
Rajput who was clearly a serial offender.
• The Uttarakhand government was compelled to appoint a
high-level committee (though quite reluctantly) to investigate
the charges. Mercifully, the committee actually submitted its
report in about two months and Rajput resigned from his
position as vice-chancellor.
 What is the Solution?
• Avoiding plagiarism is quite simple.
• The best method for avoiding it is to
simply be honest; when you’ve used a
source in your paper, give credit where
it’s due.
• Acknowledge the author of the original
work you’ve used.
 No plagiarism when..

• You are discussing your own experiences,

observations, or reactions
• You are Compiling the results of original
research, from science experiments, etc.
• You are using common knowledge
QUESTIONS?