General Guidelines for Ph D Candidates

General Guidelines for Ph D Candidates

1. Rules governing the operation of the Ph.D. programme are described in ‘Academic Regulations’ of the Institute. Section 8 of the Regulations deals with Ph.D. programme. Candidates are requested to be familiar with these regulations.
2. The candidate should clear his/her dues regularly before next semester registration.
3. All the candidates must register by following the procedures laid down by Academic Registration and Counseling Division. Failure to register in a semester without prior permission may result into striking off the name from rolls of Ph. D. programme.
4. The candidates should frequently interact with his/her supervisor(s)/mentor. No communication on progress will result into award of Not Cleared (NC) report.
5. A copy of plan of work shall be submitted to Professor-in-Charge, ARD for his approval.
6. For field trips outside the approved place of work, a complete plan indicating purpose, duration and place of visit should be given through the supervisor/mentor to Professor-in-Charge, ARD, in advance for approval.
7. One copy of each report should be forwarded through the Supervisor(s)/Mentor with his/her due recommendations for the award of Mid-semester and Final semester grade so as to reach as per the calendar given in this booklet.
8. Candidates should ensure with the supervisor(s)/mentor that the recommendation regarding Final Grades is sent to Professor-in-Charge, ARD before the last day of class-work in the particular semester/term as per the calendar given in this booklet.
9. The candidates may use photocopies of various proforma made available during the semester.
10. Change of postal, E-mail addresses and telephone numbers shall be communicated to the Professor-in-Charge, ARD.
11. ID No and Name should be used in all the communications with the Institute.
12. For using central facilities such as computing, instrumentation, workshop, IMA lab, various stores etc the candidate must follow the procedures laid down by the respective facility in-charges.
13. Two copies of draft thesis may be submitted for review by the Doctoral Advisory Committee when the research work is over. Request for title approval may be given after the pre-submission seminar.
14. It is the responsibility of candidate to inform and seek approval of Research Board for Change of Supervisor, and Topic if any.
15. Unsatisfactory grades in Thesis course for two consecutive semesters warrants the counseling by Doctoral Counseling Committee and debarring the candidate from being the rolls of Ph.D.
16. For submitting thesis 40 units of Ph.D. thesis course, 2 units of Ph. D. Seminar, 1 Units of Teaching Practice or Practice Lecture Series-I and 1 Unit of Research Methodology course is to be completed by the candidate in addition to foreign language requirement if any.
17. 4 hard bound copies of Thesis, 1 soft copy of thesis in the form of CD, 5 copies of Synopsis, DD of amount prescribed as Thesis Examination Fees, prescribed proformas and current semester grades shall be submitted to the Professor-in-Charge, ARD through the Supervisor(s) and DRC. The candidate should ensure that the Thesis title page and certificate is as per the requirements. A sealed envelope containing names and details of proposed examiners may also be provided by the supervisor(s) through DRC for completing the submission of thesis. The candidates should ensure that the thesis is being submitted as per the above requirements.
18. The thesis must be submitted with in 10 semesters of registration (5 years after the Ph.D. qualifying examination semester). Extension requirements if any should be sent to Convenor, Doctoral Counseling Committee through the respective Supervisor(s).
19. Though completion of 40 units makes the candidate eligible to submit the thesis, the candidate should ensure “Addition of Knowledge” to the field of his/her research work and should come up with his/her own contributions.
20. The candidates are advised to publish their work in International/National Refereed Journals, obtain patents and present their work in International/national Conferences of repute. It is expected that candidate publishes minimum of two research papers in peer reviewed journals before the presubmission seminar.
21. The candidate is called for Ph. D. Viva-voce examination if all the examiners give unequivocal verdict that “The Thesis is approved for Viva-voce Examination”.
22. The candidate should also furnish the details of their publications, presentations, awards, and patents every year for the Annual Report of BITS.
23. All the candidates are requested to use their active e-mail addresses for quick communication.

General Guidelines for Ph D Supervisor(s)

1. Rules governing the operation of the Ph.D. programme are described in ‘Academic Regulations’ of the Institute. Section 8 of the Regulations deals with Ph.D. programme. Supervisors are requested to be familiar with these regulations.
2. A thesis supervisor acts as instructor for various courses registered by a Ph.D. candidate and assists the Instructor-in-charge in the conduct of various Ph.D. courses of BITS.
3. The supervisor(s) as per details given in the course Handouts does assignment of work to his/her candidate in Ph.D. Thesis and Independent study courses in each semester. Setting of intermediate targets, monitoring and evaluation of assigned work is carried out by the supervisor.
4. The supervisor(s) will recommend a mid-semester and final semester grade in each course registered by his/her student and return the evaluation forms and copy of the reports submitted by his/her student, to the Professor-in-Charge, ARD by the specified dates given in the ‘calendar of events’ through DRC.
5. Any request by a Ph.D. student relating to the change of topic, extension of time limit for submission of thesis, approval of title of thesis before submission of thesis, etc is to be forwarded and recommended by the supervisor(s).
6. The supervisor(s) has to certify the originality and authenticity of the Ph.D. work of his candidate in the form of a certificate, which forms a part of the Ph.D. thesis whenever it is submitted. Names and addresses of eminent persons to act on panel of examiners are to be suggested by supervisor. These persons should be able to evaluate the thesis and conduct the viva voce examination.
7. A copy of research publications of the candidate either individually or jointly with the candidate on research work should be submitted to ARD.
8. The supervisor should announce the recommended mid-semester grade to his/her student.
9. All communication by supervisor to the Institute should be submitted through ARD
10. Kindly keep ARD informed about your latest postal and e-mail address and telephone, fax numbers. 

Guidelines for Writing the Ph D Thesis

1. Kindly ensure that your thesis meets all the standards of a scholarly writing. The entire work is divided into suitable chapters, sections, and sub-sections.
2. Kindly ensure that objectives, scope, limitations of research, general conclusions, specific conclusions, specific contributions and future scope of work are clearly spelt out in the thesis.
3. The thesis may be written in English language and may be word-processed on single side of paper. You may follow appropriate margins, line spacing, and font.  In case the numbers of pages are exceeding 350, the thesis may be printed on both the sides of paper. The appendices may be provided in a Compact Disc if the situation warrants. The page orientation may be portrait and good quality A4 size paper may be used. The pages may be numbered properly and the text is justified.
4. Thesis should be submitted after checking for plagiarism using standard plagiarism detection software. The report should be discussed with the supervisor before thesis submission. A copy of the final report should be attached along with the final thesis. 
5. Any format of quoting ‘REFERENCES’ may be followed consistently in the thesis.  The reference numbers may be quoted in square parentheses and listed towards the end of chapters or the candidates may follow author’s name followed by year of publication in bracket and list the authors alphabetically towards the end the chapters.
6. Kindly ensure that all figures, tables have suitable numbers consistently followed throughout the thesis document. Be sure to give caption to each table/figure and they are cited in the text. Mention data sources below the Tables/Figures if any. Figures should be made as self-explanatory as possible.
7. Use only standard abbreviations. Avoid abbreviations in the title. The full term for which an abbreviation stands should precede its first use in the text except in case of measurement units. The measurement units if any shall be followed consistently.
8. The suggested format of the organization of Thesis is as given below.

·         Thesis Title Page (Inner Cover) as per the format given in Annexure I

·         Certificate from Supervisor as the format in Annexure II

·         Acknowledgements

·         Abstract

·         Table of Contents

·         List of Tables

·         List of Figures

·         List of Abbreviations/Symbols

·         Chapters

·         Conclusions

·         Specific Contributions

·         Future Scope of Work

·         References

·         Appendices

·         List of Publications and Presentations

·         Brief Biography of the Candidate

·         Brief Biography of the Supervisor

8. Formats of Thesis title page and certificates given in the Annexure III should be strictly adhered to.  The Thesis should have an outer cover similar to inner cover.

Guidelines for Pre-submission Seminar

1. Submit two copies of the pre-submission draft for review by the members of the Doctoral Advisory Committee (DAC) to the DRC of concerned department
2. Kindly ensure that the copies are duly certified by the supervisor and are properly written following the guidelines for writing the thesis.
3. The exact title of thesis may also be discussed during the pre-submission seminar if the same is not already approved by the Research Board.
4. Prepare a presentation for approximately 30 to 40 minutes using Power Point. The presentation must cover the following:

·         Objectives and Scope of the Study

·         Literature review (briefly 2-3 slides only)

·         Identification of the research gaps based on literature review

·         Problem Formulation

·         Research Methodology

·         Experimentation/ Data Collection/Analysis

·         Results and discussion

·         General Conclusions

·         Specific Conclusions /Contributions of the research

·         Further Scope of Research. 

5. Inform the presentation needs.
6. Kindly ensure that slides are presenting candidate’s work predominately. It is better to make a practice presentation before actual pre-submission seminar. 
7. Note the suggestions/corrections given during the seminar.
8. The suggestions shall be discussed with supervisor(s) and incorporated in thesis.

Guidelines for Ph D Thesis Submission

1. The thesis can be submitted only after completion of pre-submission seminar on the thesis and title approval by Doctoral Counseling Committee. Exactly same title (including case, capitalization etc) should appear on the thesis.
2. Kindly ensure that suggestions/corrections discussed during the pre-submission seminar are incorporated in the thesis after discussions with the supervisor(s).
3. Formats of Thesis title page and certificates given in the Annexures should be strictly adhered to. The Thesis should have an outer cover similar to inner cover.
4. The thesis can be submitted only if the candidate is registered during that semester.
5. The thesis can be submitted only if there no Unsatisfactory/NC grade in the previous semester of submission of thesis.
6. Kindly ensure that there are no pending dues if any and there are no pending grades if any.
7. The thesis can be submitted only after completion of 40 units in Ph D Thesis course, completion of minimum 2 units in TP courses, PL-I, 1 Research Methodology, completion of min 2 units in Ph D seminar
8. Ensure that the name and title of thesis are as per the approval of DCC/Research Board
9. Submit the following at the time of thesis submission:

·         2 spiral bound copies of the thesis

·         Soft copies of thesis (in a single PDF format) and synopsis written on a CD

·         5 copies of synopsis of the thesis

·         Demand draft of requisite Thesis Examination Fees.

·         Evaluation forms for the semester of thesis submission

·         Sealed envelope containing names, communication details and brief bio-data of at least 7 eminent as prospective thesis examiners to be given by the supervisor(s) through DRC   

·         Proforma ARD/Thesis/1 and ARD/Thesis/2 duly filled in and signed by candidate and supervisor(s) in duplicate

·         1 soft copy (in a single PDF format) of thesis in form of CDs is to be submitted at the time of viva-voce examination.