To strengthen the undergraduate (UG) admission process and prevent misuse of the centralised admission portal, the West Bengal Higher Education Department is set to fully roll out an Artificial Intelligence (AI)-powered verification system this year.
The move comes after a successful pilot during last year’s admissions, where the technology flagged and blocked fake profiles with notable efficiency, as per a report by The Times of India.
This enhanced system will now be deployed with minor upgrades to automatically scan and verify ID proofs, mobile numbers, names, and photographs submitted by applicants.
The aim is to detect and eliminate fraudulent or prank applications before they can make it to the merit lists.
Why the upgrade was needed
In previous years, the system faced public embarrassment when fake applicants, sometimes using names of celebrities like Sunny Leone, Lionel Messi, and Cristiano Ronaldo, appeared in college merit lists.
In 2020, the name of Bollywood actress Sunny Leone was even listed as the top-ranking candidate for BA (Honours) in English at Asutosh College, triggering a controversy that exposed gaps in the manual verification process, according to the TOI report.
What the AI system does
According to officials from Bikash Bhavan, the AI-driven system now tracks inconsistencies between submitted documents and the applicant’s profile.
It can detect mismatched names and photos, flag duplicate applications, and even trace the source of multiple fake entries, many of which were found to have originated from certain cyber cafés last year.
“The portal was able to weed out fake applications last year. The number of complaints was minimal. This year, we expect even better results. The system is now equipped to recognise faces and identify suspicious patterns automatically,” a department official told TOI.
Impact on colleges
College principals across the state have welcomed the system. New Alipore College principal Jaydeep Sarangi shared, “Earlier, identifying fake applications was a huge challenge. Now, it is being handled efficiently by the centralised system. Inviting applications, sorting, and preparing merit lists — everything is streamlined.”
Last year, over 50 lakh applications were processed from around four lakh candidates in the first phase alone.
