Times of India: Mumbai:
Wednesday, 09 December 2015.
Taking a step
towards digitisation, Mumbai University (MU) will soon be part of a global
document authentication network that will allow alumni and students to create a
repository of verified documents.
The process
will allow alumni and students to send certified and authenticated documents
electronically to their future employer, embassies for processing of visa or to
institutions where they seek admissions for higher studies. The current process
takes over two months and is expensive for students settled abroad.
A recent RTI
query had revealed that MU received 274 fake degrees for verification by
employers.
The global
network, powered by the technology firm, myeasydocs, will have embassies, 100
foreign institutions, government offices and 1,000 employers through background
check companies for corporates in their database and can be used by students
during job hunts, admission to institutes of higher education or authentication
for visas. The database will be expanded soon.
Once the
student uploads his documents and selects his university, officials (exam
controller's office in case of marksheets and degree certificates) will search
the document in their database and verify it. The verified document will then
be sent to the employer/embassies/higher education institutes, selected by the
students. Thomas Tharakan, chief financial officer of the technology firm,
said, "If the university searches for the document manually, it may take
little more time. If the documents are digitally available with the university,
it can be done within a day." Since the verification process in institutes
of higher education in the country are not stringent, the system is more useful
for admissions to overseas universities. The verified document will remain in
the student's personal account and can be accessed multiple times.
Vice-chancellor
Sanjay Deshmukh said, "Many institutes are part of it but we will be the
first major university to adopt the technology. We will start it on a pilot
basis and then extend to all students. It will be an initiative in support of
the Centre's Digital India campaign." He added, "This will ease many
issues related to documents, especially those we attribute to human error.
Students will spend very little time getting their documents authenticated a
cheaper."
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