'CBSE students to get certificates in digital format as well'

The Central Board of Secondary Education is likely to start issuing mark sheets and certificates in digital format as well along with hard copies which can be stored by students in their digital lockers, according to a top official in the IT Ministry.
"We are working with CBSE on digital certificates. The proposal is to enable students to store their CBSE certificates in their digital locker. I expect CBSE will issue these certificates within couple of months," IT Secretary R S Sharma told PTI.
The government launched digital lockers on February 10 and within three months over 1 lakh people have started using it. Madhya Pradesh (over 24,000), Uttar Pradesh (over 17,000) and Gujarat (over 13,000) are top three states where people have registered for this facility.

The concept of digital locker is to make people free from carrying files or getting copies attested.
Any person having Aadhaar number can open digital locker account for free.
"When a government department is issuing a certificate then other government department should not make people run for verifying same document again and again. Our priority is to bring all educational institutes on board for issuing certificates that can be stored in digital locker," Sharma said.

He added, the Department of Electronics and IT is also working with various other entities to issue digital certificates.
"Along with academic certificates we are approaching other government departments that are involved in issuing any kind of certificates. PAN Card, Voter ID are also in pipeline," he said.

IT Ministry will soon start working with Oil PSUs to issue digital LPG books and with state governments for ration cards and state education board certificates.
"This all will be linked to Aadhaar number of people. People can choose documents which they want to share with someone. It can be shared by e-mail by just clicking on the share option button. Department are also making changes in their system to start accepting documents online," Sharma said.