Soon universities in Tamil Nadu will start giving scanned answer sheets instead of physical ones to students who apply for revaluation of their answers. This will ensure the student gets the answer sheets quickly by doing away with the need to find answer scripts from storerooms and lead to more focused scrutiny of answers by evaluators.

A pilot of the project will be implemented at Alagappa and Thiruvalluvar universities this year. Answer sheets of the final semester students of these two universities will be scanned first. Those of students from other semesters will be scanned later. If successful, the project will be expanded to other state universities as well.

"The two universities have been told to make adequate arrangements for the scanning and storage of the soft copies. Whenever a student applies for re-assessment or wants a copy of their answer scripts, it will be sent to their email ID," said a senior official of the higher education department. The two universities have already taken initiatives such as on-screen evaluation and have the infrastructure in place to implement the project, the official added.

Almost every university struggles to keep and manage the huge piles of answer sheets after examinations. After the implementation of the system, this is likely to be streamlined. Currently, when students apply for reevaluation, their answer sheets have to be searched out from storerooms. The process is time-consuming and tedious. Often, the answer sheets go missing too. "The move will ensure that the answer sheets are kept safely and students get them in time," said a senior official of the department.