Aspirants for KU Islamic Studies Faculty dean accuse each other of plagiarism

Teachers of the University of Karachi’s (KU) Islamic Studies Faculty have been embroiled in a tug of war over the position of the dean of the faculty, causing disruption in academic activities of the departments functioning under the Islamic Studies Faculty.

Dr Muhammad Arif Khan Saqi, the chairman of the department of Islamic learning, wrote a letter to the KU registrar on October 25, alleging that Dr Zahid Ali Zahidi, a professor in the department, has been working with Dr Atif Aslam Rao, another faculty member, to create a parallel administration.

The letter read that the two faculty members were interfering in the administrative and academic affairs of the department and there had been complaints against them of showing bigotry and extremist attitude, and treating some visiting faculty members with contempt.

Dr Saqi alleged that owing to such unrest, the only teaching associate in the department, who had worked day and night and took revolutionary steps for the betterment of the department, was forced to move to another university. “All our efforts to keep peace and dignity with these teachers are proving futile. Instead of giving a written answer, they are adopting an aggressive approach based on incomprehensible stubbornness,” the letter read.

The department chairperson also stated that in a joint welcome and farewell function for MPhil students held on October 23, the two teachers demonstrated an aggressive attitude and sabotaged the event. During the concluding remarks of the president of the event, Dr Zahidi and Dr Rao stood up and tried to snatch mike from his hands, Dr Saqi maintained.

The letter asserted that the two faculty members had badly damaged the peaceful environment of the department and they were continuously showing disregard for the legal and ethical rules of the university.

Dr Saqi requested the KU registrar to implement a decision taken in the 634th meeting of the varsity’s syndicate held on August 11, 2018. Regarding the PhD dissertation of Dr Zahidi, the syndicate had decided that the matter of his professorship would be subject to the recommendation of the plagiarism committee, after which plagiarism was proved in his dissertation.

“On the recommendation of the committee, the syndicate then decided that Dr Zahidi would delete his dissertation from his CV and could not use it for promotion,” reads the letter.

It is said that Dr Zahidi is vying for the post of the dean of the KU Islamic Studies Faculty as the incumbent dean, Dr Shahnaz Ghazi, is set to retire in December 2021.

Dr Zahidi’s stance

When The News contacted Dr Zahidi for his version, he said he was the senior most professor in the department and Dr Saqi was his junior. “I served for three years as the chairman of the department under the chairmanship rules of the KU, according to which the chairmanship rotates after every three-year term,” he said.

Dr Zahidi added that on May 20, Dr Saqi had completed his tenure as the chairman of the department and since he was the senior most professor at the department, he had to be the next chairman but KU syndicate member Moazzam Ali Qureshi recommended Dr Saqi for another term during a syndicate meeting.

According to Dr Zahidi, other members of the syndicate did not discuss Qureshi’s recommendation properly because they were dealing with another issue.

Later, the syndicate members, Dr Zahidi said, realised that extending the tenure of a department chairman was not a good practice and so they raised objections to extending the tenure of Dr Saqi. However, Dr Zahidi did not provide any evidence of this to corroborate his claim.

He also denied the allegation of plagiarism in his thesis. Sharing the background of the issue, he said there were currently three professors in the faculty, including him, Prof Dr Obaid Ahmed Khan and Prof Dr Shahnaz, who all submitted documents for the position of associate professor in 2010 and later for the position of professor in 2012.

“After two years, I came to know that Dr Shahnaz and Dr Obaid had produced some plagiarised research papers and they had cited those papers in their application for the position of professorship,” he said, adding that he had also submitted an application to the university administration against them but no action was taken.

“Later, I approached the HEC and after that, the case was referred to the university for investigations,” he stated.

Meanwhile, the two professors also filed an application against Dr Zahidi. Later, the syndicate came to the conclusion that minor plagiarism was found in the papers produced by Dr Shahnaz and Dr Zahidi. “Dr Shahnaz is the current dean of Islamic Studies Faculty while the present chairman of the Islamic learning department, Dr Saqi, is running a false campaign against me, saying that my PhD dissertation was produced through plagiarism. However, it was not my PhD thesis but some research papers, in which the syndicate had detected minor plagiarism,” Dr Zahidi said.

He added that Dr Saqi and his team wanted to malign him by spreading fake information because they did not want to see him as the next dean of the faculty. “Even he tried to ridicule me in front of students in the welcome and farewell party,” he alleged.