Plagiarism and similarity reduction in Delhi

What similarity limit and checking route does each Delhi university use?

The table puts the five sets of rules side by side. Each row is taken from the university’s own ordinance, regulations, library rules or declaration form.

The limit is a ceiling, not a target. And the same file gives different figures on Turnitin and on DrillBit, and under different exclusion settings. The UGC’s 2018 levels and exclusions are in our national plagiarism limits guide. This page covers only what the Delhi universities add to them. Still choosing a university? How each one selects scholars is explained under PhD admission in Delhi.

How do Jamia’s 3% single-source cap and self-citation rule change a revision?

Jamia’s rules sit in clause 12(l) of Ordinance 9 (IX). They’re the most detailed in Delhi.

• Where the check happens. After the pre-Ph.D. seminar, you hand the soft copy on a USB drive, CD or DVD to the designated person of your Departmental or Centre Academic Integrity Panel. The check runs in your department on Turnitin, Urkund or DrillBit. It covers the text from the abstract to the last page of the final chapter.
• Two limits at once. The whole thesis must stay at or under 10%, and each single source at or under 3%. That second limit catches people out. A literature review built around one long review article can break it while the total looks safe.
• Your own papers are split. Self-citations in the introduction and review are counted. Self-citations in the methodology, results, discussion and conclusions are excluded. So reusing your own paper’s introduction costs you, and reusing its results section doesn’t.
• A narrow exception. Some theses go above 10% because of repetitive expressions, formulations or chemical equations. Such a thesis may still be accepted if the DRC or CRC approves it with written reasons on Annexure X-B.
• What happens between 10% and 40%. You submit a revised script within six months, and that time must fall inside your maximum PhD duration. No extra time is given.
• Theses in other languages. Sometimes no database or software exists for your language. Then the supervisor certifies that the thesis is not plagiarised, and is held responsible for it. You swear an affidavit on ₹10 non-judicial stamp paper (Annexure X-C). And the DRC or CRC endorses the thesis (Annexure X-D).

When we read a Jamia report, we sort the sources by percentage and deal with anything near 3% first. Then we separate your own papers by chapter. That tells us which matches the coordinator will exclude. Our paraphrasing and quoting guide covers the rewriting itself.

How do the DU and JNU libraries run the thesis check, and how many chances do you get?

University of Delhi. Clause M.6 of the 2026 Ordinance VI has the University Library verify every thesis before submission. The DULS plagiarism page uses Drillbit-Extreme “for checking the Plagiarism of Thesis Only”. The library’s instructions tell you to email the title page and all chapters as one PDF. It can be no longer than 800 pages or 100 MB. With it goes a form listing any published work of yours to be excluded. Your supervisor signs the form, and you attach each paper’s first page. On the certificate the library enters the software used, the date, the index and the total words. The lower half of the certificate is for your supervisor. Your supervisor marks the result as under or over “accepted norms”, and must list reasons for an over. Some matches fall under the UGC exclusions: generic terms, standard symbols and equations, common knowledge, and runs of up to 14 consecutive words. Your supervisor can remove those matches through a Supervisor’s Exclusion Report, and the library then issues a revised report. The certificate lasts 30 days, and you must submit the thesis inside those 30 days. The rest of the DU submission sequence is in our Delhi University thesis format guide, and our DrillBit guide explains the report.

JNU. JNU’s current PhD ordinance is 13 (B), printed in the university’s Academic Ordinances. Under clause 12.3 you give a soft copy to a designated functionary of the Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Central Library, who issues a Plagiarism Verification Certificate for the Evaluation Branch. If an examiner sends the thesis back, you need a fresh certificate when you resubmit. The Central Library’s own rules for checking the similarity index add three points. Turnitin is used for English and other European languages. The Central Library checks drafts of theses twice only. And a draft at 10% or less is not re-checked. Ordinance 72 copies the UGC 2018 levels, so a thesis in the 10–40% band goes back to you for a revised version, due inside six months. Two checks leave no room for a trial run. So check chapters on your own account before you send the full draft. Our guide on how to read a Turnitin report helps you make sense of what you see.

What do GGSIPU’s regulations and IIT Delhi’s declaration add, including on AI?

GGSIPU. The Academic Research and Ethics Regulations, 2020 go further than the UGC text in three ways.

• Level 0 is “scattered minor similarities in phrases up to 10%, but not full sentences/paragraphs”. A thesis at 8% made up of three copied paragraphs is not Level 0.
• The exclusions are wider than the UGC’s. Methods, footnotes and endnotes, names of institutions and departments, and similarity with the scholar’s own publications on which the thesis is based are excluded.
• Self-plagiarism is defined in six forms, from republishing a paper to paraphrasing your own earlier work without full citation. Falsified or fabricated data is graded on the same levels as copying. Your department’s integrity panel can impose penalties up to Level 2 on a thesis. Level 3 goes to the institutional panel.

A notice of 15 January 2025 added a rule on the report itself. Every GGSIPU thesis must now carry your ORCID identifier, the checker’s single-page summary and its full analysis. All three go in print and on the pen drive.

IIT Delhi. Regulation R.14.6 of the PhD regulations says the thesis must follow the Institute’s policy on academic ethics and prevention of plagiarism. We couldn’t find that policy published. The student declaration comes attached to the library’s thesis submission guidelines. In it you confirm that you kept to the Honor Code and that every source of data, ideas and text is cited. You also confirm that you’ve openly stated whatever AI help you used, chatbots included.

AI in Delhi rules. At DU, the scholar’s duty to prevent misconduct in Ordinance VI covers “Artificial Intelligence generated content” too (clause E.14). None of the Delhi documents we read sets an AI percentage. But a thesis drafted with a chatbot and then disguised is just what these declarations are written to catch. Keep your drafts and version history. And before you use an AI tool, check where AI tools are acceptable in doctoral work.

Working with us from Delhi

It starts with two files from you: the report, and the thesis or paper. We study both before giving a price. Then, over video, we walk through the flagged text together. We sort it into properly quoted material, items the UGC rules exclude, referencing mistakes, and sentences you need to put in your own words. Our corrections arrive as tracked edits in Word. The follow-up report states which checker ran, and with what settings.

How we time it depends on your university. At JNU the Central Library checks a draft only twice. So we aim to have the full draft within 10% before you first send it to the Central Library. At DU, the certificate lasts 30 days, and you must submit the thesis inside those 30 days. That means our work should be done before you email the PDF to the library, with your printed copy and signatures ready. For Jamia, we look at the largest single sources first. We also mark which of your own-paper matches fall in chapters the coordinator excludes. For GGSIPU, we look for whole copied sentences even when the total is under 10%.

The official check, the forms and every signature stay with you and your supervisor. We never submit to a library or department for you, and we never use anyone’s university account. Our ethics policy explains why each change must be one you made and can explain.