Conflict between a PhD guide and his student is a common affair. What’s uncommon is the conflict reaching the apex body for education in the country i.e. Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD). A complaint by PhD student of IIT Indore against his guide has been forwarded to MHRD by Research Scholars of India. In his complaint, Shyam Singh alleged that he was being regularly harassed by his supervisor assistant professor Hem Chandra Jha, who is also head of Discipline of Biosciences and Biomedical Engineering.
Shyam alleged that the guide would insult him every now and then and told him that he will not process or continue the work of a pending manuscript. The PhD student said that he wishes continue and finish his pending manuscript and the same is denied by Jha.As per the complainant, the guide has threatened not to give authorship of the pending manuscript which he reportedly had shared with some other student.
In the complaint, Shyam also stated that Jha was not ready to be his supervisor any more. mResearch Scholars of India coordinator Nikhil Gupta stated that Shyam suffered loss of time, mental and physical health due to the actions of his supervisor. “We have forwarded the complaint to the MHRD with proofs seeking its intervention in the matter,” Gupta, an alumnus of IIT Madras said. He stated that if the matter was not resolved then they would have to stage a dharna outside the IIT Indore campus. Research Scholars of India (RSI) are the same team who have earlier protested for – and won- a fellowship hike for the postdoctoral research scholars and JRF/SRF recipients. It has more than 21000 members.
Disciplinary panel looking into matter
As IIT Indore media coordinator Rahul Sharma was unreachable, nobody from the elite institute came on record to speak about the issue. A teacher stated that the issue between Jha and Shyam is pending with disciplinary committee. It is talking to both the guide and the student.
RSI demands from IIT-Indore
