TU Thesis Format and Guidelines (2026): What Every Faculty Shares and Where They Differ
6 October 2026 · 9 min read
Students searching for “TU thesis guidelines” usually expect one document. There isn't one. Tribhuvan University's faculties and institutes each publish their own thesis guideline: the Faculty of Management (FOM) for MBS and MBA, the Faculty of Education for M.Ed., MPhil and PhD, the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences (FOHSS) for MA, and the Institute of Science and Technology (IOST) through its central departments. The guidelines agree on most things. Where they disagree, on margins, line spacing and even the edition of APA, the difference is enough to get a bound thesis sent back.
This guide sets out what the published guidelines have in common, compares them where they differ, and ends with the checks that matter whichever faculty you are in. The faculty-specific guides linked at the end go into each one in more depth.
What every TU faculty guideline shares
APA referencing. Every faculty guideline we reviewed builds on APA, though not always the same edition (see below).
A4 paper, Times New Roman 12 point for English text.
Two page-numbering sequences: lowercase roman numerals for the preliminary pages, arabic numerals starting at page 1 of Chapter 1.
A fixed set of preliminary pages: title page, declaration, supervisor's recommendation, an approval sheet signed by the head of department, supervisor and external examiner, acknowledgements, abstract, table of contents and lists of tables and figures.
A five-part body: Introduction, Review of Literature, Research Methodology, Presentation and Analysis of Data (often with discussion), and Summary, Conclusion and Recommendations or Implications.
A viva-voce examination with an external examiner, after the thesis is submitted and before the result.
A plagiarism check run through the university system before acceptance.
Where the faculties differ
These are the published differences that most often cause problems, taken from each faculty's own document. If your department has issued a newer version, that version wins.
Faculty of Management (MBS/MBA), Master's Degree Dissertation Guidelines 2019, which calls the work a dissertation rather than a thesis: APA 6th edition; 1.5 line spacing; left margin 1.25 inches (3.18 cm), and 1 inch on the top, bottom and right; printed on one side only. Front-matter pages are numbered in roman numerals at the bottom centre, and the main body in arabic numerals at the top right. The proposal runs 8 to 12 pages and the abstract one page, with up to five keywords. Two copies go to the Dean's Office. The final mark is 25% from the campus viva and 75% from two experts appointed by the Dean.
Faculty of Education, M.Ed. (Guidelines for Writing a Master's Thesis, 2020): based on APA 6th edition, adapted to use 1.5 spacing throughout, including block quotes and references, and no running head. The left margin is 1.5 inches and the others 1 inch. The abstract is capped at 400 words and the acknowledgement at one page. The inner title page carries your TU registration number, exam symbol number, and the submission and viva dates in AD. The viva must come at least one week after submission.
Faculty of Education, MPhil and PhD: APA 7th edition headings, double spacing, Preeti 16 point for Nepali text, and a title of no more than 12 words.
FOHSS, MA: as reported from the Dean's Office notice in November 2023, a minimum of 60 pages excluding references. The same report says Nepali and Hindi theses are typed in Unicode and English theses need a plagiarism check. We have not been able to read the original notice, so confirm the details with your central department.
IOST (taking the Central Department of Mathematics regulation, revised 2081, as an example): submit no earlier than six months and no later than one year after your proposal is approved, with a three-month extension possible. Two printed copies and a one-page summary go to the head of department.
Note the two contradictions inside a single faculty: the Faculty of Education asks for 1.5 spacing and APA 6 at master's level, but double spacing and APA 7 at MPhil and PhD. Students who move up a level and reuse their M.Ed. template are formatting to the wrong rules.
Plagiarism checks and the 20% figure
TU Central Library runs the university's anti-plagiarism software, and its own page states that checking is mandatory for all campuses, research units and academic writing submitted to TU. Thresholds are set at faculty level. Both the Faculty of Education (from 1 Falgun 2080) and IOST use iThenticate, require similarity below 20% at master's level, and ignore matches under 10 words and small sources under 1%. Quotations, the reference list, the abstract and the methods section are excluded from the count.
Two cautions. First, we could not verify published thresholds for bachelor's-level work or for MPhil and PhD, so do not assume 20% applies there. Second, the percentage is not the whole test. A thesis at 12% with one chapter matching a single source can still be queried, because examiners read the matches, not just the total. Our guide to acceptable similarity percentages covers how to read your own report.
Why “2026 guidelines” is the right thing to search for
TU guidelines change in small steps, with no announcement aimed at students. The Faculty of Education's plagiarism rule took effect in Falgun 2080. IOST departments revised their thesis regulations again in 2081. A new MPhil/PhD guideline was uploaded to the TU portal in June 2026. The 2019 FOM dissertation guideline has moved from its original web address, so old links to it fail. Senior students' templates and photocopied formats from a few years ago are therefore the most common source of errors.
The fix is simple: get the guideline from your own department office or central department notice board in the semester you submit, and check its date. If two documents disagree, the newer one issued by your own faculty applies, not the one a friend used.
Checks that apply in every faculty
Every objective in Chapter 1 is answered by a specific table or finding in the analysis chapter.
Roman numbering stops at the end of the preliminaries, and Chapter 1 starts at page 1.
The table of contents, list of tables and list of figures are regenerated after the final edit.
Tables are numbered by chapter, with the title above and the source below; figures have captions.
Every in-text citation appears in the reference list, and every reference is cited somewhere.
One APA edition is used consistently, the one your faculty specifies.
Signature pages are signed in every bound copy, and the number of copies matches your faculty's rule.
A similarity check has been run on the final file, not an earlier draft, before it goes to the library.
Faculty-specific guides for the formats students ask about most:
Formatting a TU thesis and not sure which version of the rules applies to you? Send us your faculty, your draft and your submission date on WhatsApp at +977 9768768340. We will check the structure and formatting against your faculty's guideline and run a similarity check before you bind.
Not sure if your work has plagiarism? Don't worry. Send it to us.
Tell us what you need checked and when it is due. Your document is checked without being stored in any student-paper repository, so the check never counts against your real submission. The reports come back with what each match means, not just a percentage.
Plagiarism report — The full similarity report on your assignment, proposal or chapter: every matched source listed, every flagged passage marked, and a plain read of which matches matter and which are your reference list doing its job.
AI report — The AI writing indicator read separately from similarity, because the two scores behave differently. If the flag looks like a detector artefact on work you wrote yourself, we tell you so, and what evidence answers it.
Thesis report — Similarity and AI reports for a full thesis or dissertation, run chapter by chapter so a problem in the literature review is found while you can still fix it, with each flagged passage explained for your supervisor.