The repeated instances of paper leaks in India's competitive exams bring to light a larger challenge facing the education system. While the government has taken steps to make laws stricter, punishments more severe, and investigations faster, the question remains whether legislation alone can help build faith among millions of students.
Each exam cycle entails years of hard work and an emotional and financial burden on aspirants and their families; when the examination process is manipulated, the repercussions are not limited to delayed result announcements or test cancellations; they create a deep void of mistrust in the exam process.
Strong laws can certainly discourage such crimes, but more action is required to eliminate factors that lead to such unpleasant situations. It is important to move from the stage of response to crises to the creation of a fraud-free examination system.
"Enhancing the exam management system is one of the key goals to be achieved," Manish Mohta, Founder of Learning Spiral said. Most often, leakages in the exam question papers occur because of failures in the question paper delivery system, which consists of the process of question paper creation, keeping, delivery, printing, and distribution.
For every stage, powerful systems must be implemented to allow electronic monitoring, restrict access to information, use document encryption, and audit the process continuously.
Technology plays a significant part in ensuring that the documents can be accessed only by authorized people. "Universities need to have the same procedures in their activities to exclude any possibilities for the occurrence of errors or violations," Manish added. Regular monitoring of the processes performed in universities should guarantee that weaknesses uncovered today will not become a problem.
Regulations and technology alone can hardly help with a problem that exists in the sphere of governance and institutional culture. "To avoid leaks of documents, it is crucial to achieve better cooperation between the examination boards, educational institutions, tech companies and law enforcement agencies," Manish said.
Open and transparent communication with the applicants during periods of uncertainty is also very important. Late and inconsistent updates are likely to lead to confusion among the applicants who do not have anything to do with the system’s dysfunction. Clear crisis management strategies have to be created for all the institutions and must ensure prompt communication, rescheduling of exams, and investigation of all irregularities.
At the same time, more attention should be paid to digitisation of the process of examination, management of the candidates, and document verification. Data-based technologies have the potential to improve monitoring, streamline compliance, and generate processes that are secure, thus minimizing chances of malpractice.
The future objective should be to create ecosystems of examinations that incorporate security, efficiency, and accountability as part of the routine process rather than responding to crises. Just as important, the creation of a culture of ethics is key. Through consistent integrity training, stringent compliance practices, and clear roles of all stakeholders, it is possible to foster an ecosystem where integrity of examinations is everybody’s concern.
Establishing credibility of the exam processes will call for much more than simply introducing stringent laws and punishments. Any form of sustainable reform is contingent upon developing secure systems, adopting technology in an appropriate manner, increasing accountability of institutions, and embracing transparency as the key to any effective exam management. Students need an examination system where knowledge is the foundation and no credibility issues can arise at any point in time. Through the prevention-based approach adopted by India, the country is well positioned to develop an exam process that not only protects the integrity of the exam process but also the hopes of millions of aspiring students.
The views expressed in this article are those of the expert and author alone. The opinions in this article do not represent the stand of Edexlive.
