Should cheating be expected to be more common in Universities in India, and if so, how could any provided credentials be evaluated for authenticity? I was a bit surprised to see the extent of cheating going on during state matriculation exams in Bihar (one of the states in eastern part of India). Looking at the images posted at twitter, it looks like large amounts of people do not have much respect for the exam process. My experience from different countries have generally been that cheaters attempt to cheat discreetly, if not so much for any other reason expect to avoid getting caught. In this example in Bihar it seems that getting caught was not a major concern for those cheating.



In this other article about above situation, an individual is quoted as saying:


  "Any examination of this scale in any part of the country has similar complaints."


I had earlier read about corruption being quite common in India, it is just that I did not expect it have led to this type of behavior in public. For example I had an Indian friend who told me how he had obtained his car driving license years earlier without any kind of tests or qualifications by just paying a clerk at the driving license office. This sort of stories are present also in articles like this one from Reuters that says:


  (Reuters) - Mahesh Kundu paid $45 for a driving license, Rupam Bhatia $110 to be admitted to hospital and Vishrant Chandra $130 for a marriage certificate. These are the commonplace bribery stories experienced by middle-class Indians who have poured into the streets to say "enough is enough."


For one reason or another I thought that this sort of requests for money always happened discreetly and money was always exchanged quietly, "under the counter". Looking at this rather public event in Bihar made me wonder, though, about what effect the level of corruption in India may have on any qualifications earned at their universities. How would you know whether a student has actually earned their qualifications?
This particular incident doesn't happen to be an university examination. This is the final grade 10h school exam that was conducted centrally by the government of state of Bihar, India. BSEB. The given situation is being highly criticized by Indian media and Indian people as well.  

Coming to the question, Yes there is a lot of widespread corruption and malpractices prevalent in India. I can't guarantee you that there had been no cheating involved in passing a student in regard to any examination. However, in Indian universities especially the top ones, the aforementioned phenomenon is quite rare. Moreover, the admissions to these  top universities is quite competitive and often based on entrance exams. You can cheat to pass an exam but you can't score enough to get a rank under 25k out of 1.4 million candidates. (AIEEE) 
That said, there are various other parameters to judge a candidate as well. Even let us suppose that a student has been able to cheat his/her way throughout, there is always an interview round to any job or any position.