Students aspiring to study engineering this year won’t have to visit “reporting centres” to get their testimonials verified before admission because the Covid pandemic has forced the state JEE board to conduct the process online, a board official said.

The board announced the measure while announcing the results of the Bengal JEE, which were held in February.

Altogether, 73,119 candidates had written the test on February 2 and 72,298 will receive rank cards.

The board’s vice-chairman, Dilip Kumar Mitra, said they had made some “special arrangements” this year so candidates could take admission without exposing themselves to any health hazard.

“The engineering aspirants will not be required to go to any reporting centre to get their documents verified after they lock their choice for an institute during online counselling,” Mitra said. “The verification process will be held online.”

The candidates have to upload documents such as the Class X and Class XII mark sheets on the counselling portal developed by the board during registration. “The documents will be verified by the virtual reporting centres. Candidates need not visit any reporting centre amid the pandemic,” Mitra said.

An official said a candidate would get a text message if all documents were accepted by a virtual reporting centre. “An alert will be sent if any document is rejected. He or she can log in and find out the reason for rejection. The candidate can also contact the central control room in the board’s office,” the official said.

Documents will be physically verified when campuses reopen. The counselling is likely to start on August 12.

A board official said that earlier the candidates would have to visit reporting centres for verification of documents after locking their choice for an institute. They would pay the semester fee only after their testimonials were vetted by the centre.

The special measures also include making provisions to help students encountering connectivity issues so they could take part in the online counselling.

The board has set up more than 17,000 service centres across the state where students without internet connectivity at home could register for counselling, upload documents and choose an institute where he or she would like to study. Earlier, such students would have to visit cyber cafes to get the work done.

“Services at these centres will be free…. The list of the service centres will be announced soon,” said Mitra.

Figures released by the board shows that 51 per cent of the students on the merit list are from the Bengal board, compared with 31 per cent from the CBSE. But among the top 10, eight are from the CBSE. Only one student from the Bengal board is in the top 10, at the eighth position.