DigiLocker & AAERI launch platform to speed up student document checks

NEW DELHI: For students heading Down Under, paperwork could soon be going under. DigiLocker and the Association of Australian Education Representatives in India (AAERI) have launched a digital platform aimed at speeding up document verification for Indians applying to Australian universities.

Called AAERI Verify, the platform has been developed by AAERI in collaboration with the National e-Governance Division (NeGD) under the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY). It was unveiled at the AAERI Annual Convention in New Delhi on August 7.

The platform integrates directly with DigiLocker to enable secure, paperless and consent-based verification of students’ academic, identity and financial documents. Instead of relying on physical paperwork and lengthy manual checks, students can share digitally signed records directly from the original issuing authorities.

The system is designed around two stages. The first, called the Student Check, takes place before a university application is submitted and focuses on verifying the student’s credentials. The second, the Sponsor Check, begins after an admission offer and is intended to authenticate financial records and sponsorship details.

With the student’s explicit consent, Australian universities will be able to access source-verified digital records through the platform. The approach is designed to reduce the risk of fraudulent documents while giving students greater control over how their information is shared.

“This collaboration demonstrates how India’s Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) is solving real-world global challenges. By integrating DigiLocker with AAERI Verify, we are providing a secure, paperless, and trusted framework that simplifies the entire international admission process for our students,” said NeGD’s director JL Gupta.

Gupta also outlined NeGD’s role in building and managing India’s Digital Public Infrastructure. Established as an independent business division under MeitY in 2009, NeGD supports technology projects, policy frameworks and technology appraisals across the government ecosystem.

Its platforms support digital workflows for organisations including the Union Public Service Commission, Ministry of External Affairs and NITI Aayog.

DigiLocker, a flagship initiative under MeitY’s National e-Governance Division, provides citizens with a secure, consent-based platform to store, share and verify authentic digital documents issued by authorised organisations.

The platform now has more than 72 crore registered users and supports the issuance, storage, sharing and real-time verification of digitally signed documents.

With AAERI Verify, India’s digital document infrastructure is now being extended into the international education journey. For students and universities alike, the aim is to replace a paper trail with a digital one that is faster, easier to verify and harder to fake.