This study examines the effectiveness of critical thinking and self-awareness via peer evaluation to foster writing skills in English. The increased use of AI assistance adversely affected the writing skills of college students; therefore, this study primarily seeks the way to improve writing skills via peer evaluation. The study conducted among the first-year graduate students of arts and science (N = 120) at a university in Bangalore, India. The conceptual framework of this study owed to the theories of Lev Vygotsky especially on the concepts of social learning, collaborative learning and ZPD. The data collected through survey and experimental study. The analysis of survey data proved that critical thinking and self-awareness positively predicted the improvement in writing skills. The improvement in writing skills via peer evaluation is analysed through experimental data. The experimental data statistically analysed via a ‘paired sample t test’. The t value is highly significant in this test with the marks of pre-test and post-test. The findings of this study suggested to adopt peer evaluation as a pedagogical tool in Indian English classrooms.