All government and private medical, dental and AYUSH colleges in Andhra Pradesh will start issuing high-security degree and post-graduation marks and migration certificates from March 1 as part of Dr. NTR University of Health University (NTRUHS)’s modernisation drive.
Sample certificates have already been brought out and the actual issue of these water, tamper and tear-proof certificates which will have the student’s performance encrypted in the form of bar codes printed on the backside is set to begin next month.
Speaking to The Hindu, NTRUHS Vice-Chancellor C.V. Rao said the certificates could be preserved for several years, and their authenticity could be checked at the time of scrutiny, which was the main objective of adopting the high-security printing technology. The certificates would have the logo of NTRUHS embossed on them. The university is also poised to introduce face reading-based biometric system for registering the attendance of faculty and students in all colleges. It has set aside the conventional method of collecting thumb-impressions as sometimes these could be faked. Attendance records would be uploaded to a central server on a daily basis.
Besides, NTRUHS has prepared the ground for giving affiliation online, which saves time and money spent on physically complying with the procedures and the entire administration is being converted into e-Office, for which training to the officers and employees has been imparted and the systems have been put in place with the support of National Informatics Centre (NIC).
This is all part of the efforts to not only give NTRUHS a corporate look but also improve its efficiencies by going hi-tech. But, despite the emphasis laid on changing with the time, a basic thing that has been pending for over three decades is the proposal for sanctioning a campus college for NTRUHS.
An idea to designate Siddhartha Medical College (SMC) as the campus college never materialised. Incidentally, SMC now accommodates the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS)-Mangalagiri on a temporary basis.