As the Railways prepares to conduct the world’s largest online exam, with 2.3 crore applicants, it faces a challenge in keeping the examination process tamper-proof.

Taking a cue from its past experiences, and those of other large exam conductors, it has opted for a two-layered filter to validate crores of applications.

The recent spate of paper ‘leakages’ in key exams such as CBSE and CLAT has made the Railways more wary. It has decided not to conduct exams in ‘hired premises’, and look for technologies that can nab ‘e-cheating’.

“We, as well as some of the exam conducting agencies, have the experience of conducting exams for 47 lakh applicants, but nobody has conducted online exams for 1.9 crore applicants,” Debal Kumar Gayen, Member - Staff, Railway Board, told BusinessLine. Of the 2.37 crore applications that the Railways received for 1 lakh posts, 47 lakh applications are for Group C posts, and 1.9 crore are for Group D posts.

Equal opportunity

Validating 2.3 crore applicants itself proved to be a huge challenge. “First, there was a computerised filtering process, followed by manual validation. For instance, some photographs are not very clear, which makes verification of candidates in the exam hall difficult. We are giving the applicants a second chance to upload their photographs,” Gayen said.

Some quirky applicants uploaded photos of buildings in place of their own. In the last Railway exam for 14,000 vacancies, 92 lakh people applied, but only 57 lakh appeared.

Cheating trends

The Railways have been studying cheating trends. “In some of the recent exams, the trouble related mostly to hired premises such as coaching centres,” said Gayen.

Even so, the country’s single largest government employer, with 13 lakh people on its rolls, is aware of its limits in the catch-me-if-you-can game. “Technology has advanced so much that candidates come up with innovative ways,” observed Gayen. “Electronic cheating devices are plentiful: what if somebody were to put a Bluetooth-embedded device in his/her clothes?”

For the first time, the Railways is looking to appoint an agency through a quality-cum-cost-based selection (QCBS) process. Earlier, a nomination process was used. “Now, the challenge is finding a proper agency that is reliable,” said Gayen.