It is with the feeling of desolation and sorrow that I write to you this letter, and like to bring to your kind notice the completely erroneous and irresponsible ‘follow-up’ story filed by your reporter Santwana Bhattacharya, titled ‘Copy caught, NCERT has.’ on October 6. Instead of reporting/writing the ‘official statement’ made to the concerned reporter, she completely twisted, distorted, fabricated and exaggerated the comments.I must maintain here that I have been virtually threatened by the reporter to speak what the reporter wanted to hear. And when I humbly refused and categorically maintained that the questions cannot be answered right now, all my ‘official comments’ (given to her earlier during the conversation) were brutally distorted, mutilated and twisted.A comparison between the official statement made to the reporter and statements published by the newspaper:• Our comment: ‘‘We receive suggestions and comments from various sources like academic institutions, educationists, press, individuals and industry associations.’’• Fabricated/changed by the reporter: ‘‘We have received a huge number of complaints, some are as serious as this one (plagiarism).’’• Our comment: ‘‘As per the policy of NCERT, all suggestions/inputs are received in right earnest and then examined and analysed. We then incorporate changes, wherever necessary (based on our review), in our reprints. The same will happen in this case’’.• Fabricated/changed by the reporter: ‘‘If any instance of plagiarism detected, the textbooks will be reprinted’’.• Our comment: ‘‘If any steps are taken, the reporter will be informed.’’• Fabricated/changed by the reporter: ‘‘The Director has asked the authors to explain their position and how it happened. Some concrete steps will be taken.’’— Vineet Joshi, NCERTSantwana Bhattacharya replies: First, there was no ‘‘official statement made to the reporter’’. All the quotes attributed to Vineet Joshi in the report are from his response, over the telephone, to my questions. They are his exact quotes. There was no ‘‘twisting’’ or ‘‘distortion’’ or ‘‘mutilation’’ as alleged. Also, it is important to note that there is no mention of the key issue involved — plagiarism — in Mr Joshi’s note.
