Centre to rationalize scholarships for SC/ST/OBC | Economic Times

The government is set to rationalise all scholarships given to meritorious students belonging to Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backward Classes and minorities to award equal amounts to students of the same class. This is likely to impact over 3 crore students, a majority belonging to OBCs.According to sources, the move comes after a directive from Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) to rationalise all scholarships. A government source told ET, “There has been an observation that children belonging to different castes studying in the same class get different amounts as scholarships. This is because these scholarships are disbursed by different central ministries. It was felt that this could perpetuate a divide amongst children. Therefore, the issue is being examined.”A group of ministers, headed by defence minister Rajnath Singh, is examining the rationalisation of scholarships in detail. The government, however, faces a difficult task when it undertakes rationalisation of scholarships – it cannot reduce the monetary amount to bring all scholarships to the same level, as it will not go down well with beneficiaries, and increasing the amount across board could mean an additional burden of Rs 10,000 crore annually on the government.An official involved in the rationalisation exercise, who did not wish to be identified, told ET, “We are working out the finer details of this exercise to ensure parity among students. The rationalisation will not mean any scholarship amount is reduced.”At present, the ministry of social justice and empowerment disburses the greatest number of scholarships to socially and economically weaker sections. This includes about 2.1 crore scholarships to OBC students and 90 lakh to Scheduled Castes students.The ministry of tribal affairs disburses about 30 lakh scholarships to Scheduled Tribe students. The minorities affairs ministry disburses another 40 lakh scholarships. How different is the assistance can be gauged by the fact that a pre matric scholarship for ST students applies to Classes 9-10 but pre-matric scholarship for minorities students is awarded to students from Class 1 to 10. Pre matric scholarship for ST students is Rs 225 per month for day scholars and Rs 525 per month for hostellers for a period of 10 months in a year. However, minority affairs ministry’s pre matric scholarship includes admission and tuition fee and a maintenance allowance making a student eligible for a scholarship upward of Rs 500 per month.Students with disabilities also have different scholarship amounts which include a standard monthly allowance of Rs 500 for day scholars and Rs 800 for hostellers and disability allowance ranging between Rs 2000 and 4000 per annum. However, it has not been finalised whether the government would include students with disabilities also in this rationalisation exercise.