Ready-to-cheat: Students pay peanuts for second-hand dissertations

By Umer Farooq. PESHAWAR: “It was a small makeshift stall at a market inside University of Peshawar (UoP); I was shocked when the photocopier handed over a list of available ready-made theses on around 30 topics.” Akhtar Shah* tells the story of how a student can obtain a ‘thesis of choice’ without doing any of the heavy lifting associated with research. It would seem the UoP has become the top destination for those studying abroad – particularly in European universities – to buy these dissertations, The Express Tribune learnt. At a steal, each research paper can cost anything from Rs900 to Rs1,200. The price varies according to the number of pages or whether the work is bought in the form of a softcopy or in print. Suite...