Paperless administration in Indian higher education

Abstract

The Higher Education sector in India is witnessing massive and exponential growth in terms of number of students and institutions. The procedures associated with the academic processes such as admission, teaching, examination and support services have also grown manifold. Institutions, irrespective of the size and scale, can practice better paperless administration using content ecosystem and digital tools. Both government and institutions make use of digital communication and customized applications. However, the over-dependence on paper in data processing is still a continued practice which necessitates the maintenance of volumes of physical documents by the administrative and academic departments that many times leads to delays in responses. The ideal scenario of a paperless learning environment may not be feasible in reality but the extents of paper usages can be brought down drastically to minimum levels with proper knowledge of information life cycle. The digitization with complete e-governance ensures paperless administration process. The institutions are having improbable idea to process automation and reducing paper consumption. This paper analyses the practices and methods in vogue that minimize usage of paper - based system and explores the feasibilities of interdependent work flow automation to make it better.