Incidences of forged certificates could soon become a thing of the past with the Government on Monday unveiling a pilot project which would be the national database of storing academic qualifications in an electronic format.

The database by National Academy Depository would facilitate online verification of academic awards issued by boards and universities, thereby identifying attempts made to use fake and forged academic certificates.

Students can also overcome their fear of losing a certificate as they too can can access the database anytime and anywhere.

Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), which had initiated the pilot project, would make available the database of Central Teacher Eligibility Test (CTET) 2011 and CBSE Board XII exam 2011 on this interface to begin with.

"This will be a national database for all academic qualification in electronic format. It would facilitate online verification of academic awards and therefore we can identify which are fake and genuine degrees," HRD Minister Kapil Sibal told reporters in the Capital.

The pilot programme was undertaken by Central Depository Services and National Securities Depositories, the only two depositories registered with SEBI.

The Government has already drafted a legislation in this regard and it has been approved by the Union Cabinet and would be presented in Parliament in the upcoming Monsoon Session, he said.

The interface will provide access to CBSE to the database and facilitate CBSE to efficiently lodge, in the database, the academic qualifications awarded by it.

The depository will be available to CBSE free of cost for three months and thereafter it may be implemented at a fee to be decided mutually by the CBSE and the depositories, Sibal said.

Entities that are desirous of availing online verification of the academic awards of the above mentioned examinations can register online on https://nad.ndml.in/NAD, www.ndml.in and http://www.nad.co.in

The depositories will provide efficient online verification of any specific academic qualification lodged in the database and verify and authenticate any specific academic qualification in the database when so requested by any person.

It would also provide an authenticated copy of any specific academic qualification in the database when so requested by any person. It would also ensure that the CBSE database is, at all times, accessible online to authorised persons, said CBSE chairman Vineet Joshi.