A Pakistani student has launched legal action against the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), alleging academic negligence after a marking error during her undergraduate degree cost her a chance to pursue an MPhil at the University of Cambridge.
Rehab Asad Shaikh, originally from Khairpur Gambat in Sindh, says LSE’s handling of her dissertation assessment in 2023 significantly altered her academic trajectory and caused lasting professional and emotional harm. She is seeking an apology, compensation, and institutional accountability.
Shaikh moved to the UK in 2020 after graduating from Karachi Grammar School and completed her undergraduate degree in policy studies at LSE in 2023. She later earned a master’s degree in Modern South Asian Studies from the University of Oxford, though she says Oxford was not her first choice.
According to Shaikh, her plans to apply for an MPhil at Cambridge were disrupted when her LSE undergraduate dissertation was marked under exceptional circumstances. Due to the UK-wide Marking and Assessment Boycott that year, her dissertation was assessed by a single examiner rather than the standard double-marking process. She received a score of 57, which she believes weakened her application to Cambridge.
After exhausting internal appeals and complaints procedures at LSE, Shaikh escalated the matter to the Office of the Independent Adjudicator (OIA). More than two years later, the university agreed to re-mark her dissertation. The revised assessment raised her score from 57 to 72, a 15-point increase.
Despite the substantial change, LSE maintained that no fault had occurred and rejected claims that the original assessment caused meaningful harm. The university concluded that the stress, delays, and missed opportunities cited by Shaikh were “self-reported” and not material.
Speaking to Geo News, Shaikh said she has initiated legal proceedings to seek justice. “My paper was not quality assured to the standard it should have been. I am asking for recognition of that failure, compensation for the harm caused, and assurance that this does not happen to other students,” she said.
Shaikh also described further distress following the correction of her mark, when her transcript briefly indicated she had received a departmental academic prize before the university reversed the decision, later reinstating it after acknowledging the error.
She said letters from healthcare professionals documenting anxiety and distress were dismissed by the administration as unpersuasive. “It shows how easily emotional impact is minimised when institutions judge their own conduct,” she said.
Now working in a senior role within a UK government ministry, Shaikh believes her career path would have been different had the marking issue been handled properly.
She added that since speaking publicly, several former students have contacted her with similar complaints about delays, lack of transparency, and limited concern for student welfare after graduation.
“A 15-point mark change is rare. A two-and-a-half-year delay is damaging,” she said. “The real question is whether universities are equipped to respond fairly when students challenge outcomes — and whether they take wellbeing seriously when they do.”
