Online PhD submission will make the evaluators accountable

Online PhD submission will make the evaluators accountable

c-Puniti.Pandey@timesgroup.com

27.09.2021

The University of Delhi (DU) will soon move the thesis submission and evaluation process for PhD to online mode. The decision has been taken to smoothen the procedure and reduce the long delays that take place in the existing model.

“It is a student-friendly move aimed at decreasing the delay in the evaluation process that follows after the students submit their thesis. After the launch of the online portal and the implementation of the new mode, the evaluators will be compelled to take immediate action on the research papers. This will further put a stop to file blockage,” says PC Joshi, former vicechancellor, DU.

Explaining the need to introduce the online portal for PhD, D S Rawat, dean of examination, DU says, “Offline mode had several challenges, as the students and the university authorities had to wait for the examiners' response over the copy. Under the new setup, the thesis will be immediately mailed to the concerned examiner. The authorities will also keep reminding them to revert on the thesis shared. An alert will be flagged in case they exceed the time limit on one thesis.” The university has also altered the current ordinance to further improve the evaluation process. Under current norms, the examiner can submit the list for the viva process within a month of the thesis submission. Under the new setup, the supervisors will be required to submit the list of viva-voce before or on the day of the thesis submission. This will again reduce the long delays that were caused in allotting supervisors to each student, he explains.

The online submission of PhD thesis requires strict monitoring to maintain data security, notes Sanjeev Bansal, dean, Faculty of Management Studies, Amity University. Just as strict confidentiality is maintained at the time of submitting the hard copy of the thesis, the authorities would need to take measures to avoid any kind of threat to data in online mode. “Amity had been following the online mode of PhD for a long time. We had been holding seminars for PhD students for over a decade. During the pandemic induced lockdown, they were also allowed to submit the thesis online,” he adds.

The students should not suffer the adverse consequences of long delays in getting their PhD degrees, says D Narayana Rao, pro vice-chancellor, SRM University, Andhra Pradesh (SRMAP). Many of them lose job opportunities that demand the submission of PhD degrees within a stipulated time. The online submission of PhD thesis will help in reducing delays and save the expenditure incurred on printing multiple heavy copies of the research papers.