Friday, June 19, 2015

‘Digital India’ initiative to take books, certificates & IDs online

Problems like not being able to locate an old Class X certificate needed to renew a passport or for some other official work may get sorted out easily. Even scholarship opportunities in India will be on one platform which will ensure easy application process and disbursement, but most importantly no missing out on opportunities.

Come July 1, 2015, Government of India is planning to launch under 'Digital India' a number of ambitious projects like eBasta on which all NCERT text books as well as some State Boards' textbooks will be available online for downloading from an app free of cost. Another initiative for Aadhaar card holders will be digital locker—DigiLocker—facility which will enable Indians to secure their certificates and access them online at the click of a button. Filling up online forms using the e-sign facility and the DigiLocker will ensure elimination of usage of fake documents.

According to highly placed sources in the department of Information Technology, under the ministry of communication and information technology, these are the pet projects of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his office has been personally monitoring the preparation and implementation of the projects.

Cheating in exams a national phenomenon

Images of parents and friends scaling walls and clinging to windows to help Bihar students taking their Class X exams are still fresh.

These scenes might not have surprised many given the state of education in that region, but this aberration has become a national phenomenon with at least 12 major question paper leaks in as many months affecting lakhs of students across states - be it CBSE AIMPT 2015, or UPPSC or UP combined pre-medical test or the TN Board Class XII maths paper or Jamia Millia's engineering and BDS entrance test paper leaks.