By Kamal Pratap Singh, Managing Editor- Biotech Express
It is shocking to see that one of India’s most revered biotechnologists has been dragged by the Elsevier publishers who have now retracted some of his publications from their journal (Bioresource Technology) for no fault of his. It came to light when the news was published in The Hindu that quoted PubPeer having shared the retracted articles due to ethical misconduct and not scientific misconduct. When one delves into these papers, it is noted that the authors have vehemently denied that retraction but Elsevier which is a multi-billon dollar publisher perhaps due to the reasons best known to them went ahead to tarnish the image of one of the globally reputed biotechnologist who has not only brought Indian science to fame but also helped and mentored scientists from round the globe and built their careers.
It appears that the row began as his name was included in some publications as a co-author during the revision stage with him being the Editor in Chief (EIC) of the journal. He has been the EIC of the journal for over a decade and brought this journal to global recognition from an impact factor of around 3 (or so) when he became the EIC to an impact factor of >11 (IF of 2022 announced in 2023). It has also seen an exponential increase in the number of articles published per annum.
The articles that have been retracted were due to procedural lapses on part of the Journal manager and the publisher and Professor Pandey cannot be held responsible blaming him as an ethical misconduct.
Lte’s see what the reasons are given by Elsevier in these retractions. The first one is about the authorship change during the revision stage of the papers. In this regard, reliable sources informed that if an author is added or deleted at the revision stage, the journal manager should raise a query with the corresponding author to give an explanation about this. However, no such query was raised by the journal manager for any of the papers, hence, (corresponding) authors assumed that the change was accepted by the journal.
The second stated reason in these papers is about the review process. Let’s see the rule position for this also. In this regard, reliable sources informed that if an editor’s name is there among the list of authors of the papers, the editor should be blinded by the journal (manager). But this was not done by the journal manager.
The above details very clearly show that the decision to retract the papers is a biased and highly unfair decision, without any basis and intended to malign the image of Prof Pandey, who has contributed significantly towards the growth of not only this journal, making it as the first choice to publish by the authors from all over the world, but also helped Elsevier’s in many other projects, including launching of a new journal (BITE Reports) and creating and launching BIORESTEC, the flagship conference of BITE, among others, as I understood from reliable sources.
- Focus on Authorship, Not Scientific Merit: These retractions are based solely on concerns regarding authorship, not on any findings of scientific misconduct or data manipulation. A detailed review on platforms like Pubpeer, where researchers openly scrutinize published work, revealed no concerns about the scientific validity of papers.
- Procedural Misunderstandings: These retractions stem from the procedural misunderstandings and misinterpretations of authorship guidelines, not at all any intentional actions of the authors.
At last, but the most important point to note here is that all retractions are for same reason, i.e., author ‘s conflict of interest (note that the current policy of journal on this is only a few years ago, and was not there apparently say around 2010-2015 or so). Not even a single instant of scientific discrepancy or misconduct and the mistake has been solely on part of the journal manager.
The global scientific community has shown great distress that such issues are blown out of proportion, thereby demeaning the collaborative research being done globally for common good of mankind.
Some highly placed sources have expressed concerns that such acts of the publishers could be aimed at showing the authors of developing countries in bad light, in particular from Asian countries, who have risen high in global scientific contributions.
It is worth to mention here that most of the retracted papers are highly cited articles, showing their high scientific contribution and recognition by the global scientific community.
As such, Elsevier has been time and again accused for unethical conduct (see: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2023/may/07/too-greedy-mass-walkout-at-global-science-journal-over-unethical-fees). While Elsevier has made apparently millions of dollars based on the publications of these article over the years, the retraction now brings a great shock to the authors as many of these have used tax-payers money for their projects and several years to conduct research.
The retractions, which is solely due to the internal failure of processes have suddenly put researchers from a large number of countries and several dozens of authors to shame for no fault of theirs. Till this article was being compiled, the Editor of this magazine has been informed by reliable sources that some of the authors from different countries are considering approaching the court against this decision of Elsevier to retract these papers.
This high handedness of foreign publishers should be discussed on Indian as well as global platforms as has been done for subscription models where the scientists are doing all the work funded mostly by the Government funding agencies. However, publishers are making a huge profit without any scientific contributions. Indian Government has already taken a view to counter this by taking a step towards one nation one subscription. This perhaps will follow suit in other countries as well to curb this menace.
Again, the most important point here to note is that neither the quality of research not scientific data has been questioned in any of these papers; the retraction is based on charges of authorship changes and editorial process.
Let’s also see a very important point here. Informed sources revealed that Prof Pandey was appointed EiC in 2011 and during his tenure of more than a decade, his contract must have been renewed several times (source informed that usually editorial contracts are made for 2-3 years). One would simply understand a point here that if the contract was renewed by Elsevier several times, it must have been based on his excellent performance, which obviously included editorial and ethical conduct. How and why, suddenly after 13 years, Elsevier found fault on him and have charged with unethical conduct?
The above details very clearly show that the decision to retract the papers is a biased and highly unfair decision and intended to harm the name and fame of Prof Pandey and several co-authors.
2 Comments
Many people are jealous about Dr. Pandey’s scientific accomplishments and I think it’s another attempt to tarnish him
The retractions are valid and very much warranted. Dr. Ashok Pandey, got his name added to the articles received by him as a handling editor. Why would an editor ask the authors to make him (the editor) one of the authors in the paper? This is unforeseen and considered ethically incorrect. It demonstrates a quid pro quo arrangement between the authors and the editor wherein the editor may promise acceptance in exchange for authorship.
Dr. Ashok Pandey is an intelligent scientist and not naive. He very well understood the conflict of interests when he was handling the same papers as an editor, on which he was also an author.