Newage copycats get smarter with hi-tech gadgetsDwaipayan Ghosh & Manash Pratim Gohain, TNN Jan 12, 2012, 02.23AM IST NEW DELHI: While the AIIMS entrance scandal has turned the spotlight on cheating in high-profile institutions, academicians and police sources say the use of unfair means has grown rampant generally in recent years. And the trend is global. A survey done by an American institute in 50,000 colleges and 18,000 high schools across the world found that 70% students cheat. In 1993, cheating was not so prevalent - 56% - while in 1963 only 26% students had used unfair means in exams.Experts say moral training from childhood and a strict vigil in the examination hall are the ideal solution to the problem, but institutes with reputations to uphold are not taking any chances. Some, like Italy's Eriso Tosi Technical Institute, now use military-grade mobile jammers to stop students from cheating. In India, invigilators have not kept up with technology but unscrupulous students seem to be making the most of it. From mobile phones to Bluetooth devices designed especially for cheating, they are using them all.

At the school level, chits or handwritten slips are still the chief means of copying as mobile phones and other gadgets are not allowed in the exam venue. "Most school students cheat using handwritten slips hidden in socks, collars or straps of wristwatches.

But asking around for answers is not so common now as multiple sets of question papers have been used in exams since the '90s," says MC Sharma, controller of exams, Central Board of Secondary Education. He mentions two instances of examinees declaring they have chicken pox, only to get inside the mosquito net and start texting.In higher institutions, cheating is now done with gadgets. In 2005, the authorities were shocked when 21 students scored identical marks in physics in the Delhi College of Engineering entrance exam. A CBI enquiry found a former DCE student had helped the students for Rs 4 lakh each. He gave them SIM cards that were activated just before the exam.Impersonation, micro-Xerox and MMS are some of the new technologies in use. Students have also been caught using Bluetooth devices. In Jamia Millia Islamia, several cases of senior students or outsiders impersonating aspirants in entrance tests have come to light."Use of technology is more about organized use of unfair means. At a basic level, handwritten slips have given way to micro-Xerox with which students photocopy text books in miniature form. The more tech savvy candidates use MMS and receive answers on the phone. Although it is generally illegal, students smuggle mobiles in at times," said professor PB Sharma, V-C of Delhi Technological University.

If the same student is found copying/cheating in an examination in any other following semester/s, he/she will be deemed to have withdrawn from the programme.

Xerox Machine

Micro Xerox

Blower