YCMOU ties up with Inflibnet to help research

NASHIK: The Yashwantrao Chavan Maharashtra Open University has signed an agreement with the Information Library Network, an autonomous organization of the University Grants Commission (UGC) that allows accessing and uploading PhD research theses worldwide for students pursuing research work. The move is a step further towards the university’s decision to restart the PhD coursework in its curriculum from the coming academic year and help students access good material for research.
The Information Library Network, or Inflibnet, has a database of doctoral theses of around 77 universities across the country, which can be accessed globally. The database is managed by a server located in Ahmedabad. As many as 3,000 universities, colleges and educational institutions across the country depend on Inflibnet’s resources.
Vice-chancellor of YCMOU Manikrao Salunkhe said, “The MoU was signed on March 20. Whenever the topic of research work comes up, its quality is always questioned, along with plagiarism issues.”
The main objective behind signing the MoU is to eliminate cases of plagiarism, which Inflibnet takes care of through its plagiarism software. Besides, the students will now be able to showcase their research work across the world for other students’ reference, Salunkhe added.
After a student confirms his/her PhD title and uploads it on the database, the research in progress will be uploaded and can be accessed by the students across the country to avoid duplication of the title.
“The research work could be exchanged, which would be beneficial for students from other faculties. For science-related research, often, only an abstract is available, which is not so easy for the student to work on, especially if he is pursuing research in arts or other fields. This move will help avoid repetition of work and guarantee authenticity,” the vice-chancellor added.
The regional study centres of the university located in various parts of the state would also be provided with the database in phases to be accessed by the students.
The Inflibnet manages a database named ‘Shodhganga’ that holds the PhD thesis in full text form. Around 77 universities across the country have uploaded PhD thesis on the database, which can be accessed globally.
‘Shodhgangotri’, another feature of the Inflibnet, offers a bibliography of PhD thesis, which is in progress. There are over 96,000 bibliography titles available in the database.
The students will have access to research topics in various universities across the country and get ideas to work on their own PhD topics. This will also help eliminate the redundancy of the PhD topics. Besides, it will help students know research trends and specializations in subjects. Director of Inflibnet Jagdish Arora, who had visited the university, said that YCMOU was one of the very few varsities that have subscribed to the anti-plagiarism software. “The UGC has also given funds to set up a lab as students are prompted to produce research work in multimedia, which is not only limited to text, but has extended to video, audio and other forms,” he said.