18.03.2024

Scholarships (Outlines)

1. Illustrations of dithering grants.

ü  Due to organized scam nearly 2.38 lakh students did not get pre-matric and post matric scholarships from 2009-10 to 2016-17.

ü  No budget was released during the financial years 2018-19, 19-20 & 20-21 and 50677 students did not get pre matric scholarships during those years.  Similarly, due to deficient grants 5316 students did not get post matric scholarship during these years.

ü  No budget was released for post matric scholarship in 2021-22. Liabilities were cleared during 2022-23.

ü  During financial year 2022-23 Pre matric scholarships were not released to 19691 eligible students and to 22804 post matric eligible students.

ü  No post matric scholarships have been provided in Govt medical Colleges for the last seven years.

ü  The rate of scholarships are parochial-ranging from 625 to 7000 for day scholars and 1875 to 13500 to hostelers per annum.

l  Inescapable ramification of such predicament is drop outs.

2.  Imperative affirmative action

l  Scholarship Schemes for SC/ST/OBC may be recast and made need based. Scholarships should come  to the rescue of deprived at the time of admissions and periodically thereafter.

l  Schemes may be rationalized- also to cater to boarding/lodging needs - and  to keep pace with sustained upsurge in cost of education-particularly professional and technical.

l  Scope of scholarships may be extended to studies in designated overseas Institutions. Some States have such succoring measures.

l  Students whose scholarships were not paid may be compensated for disadvantage and loss of opportunities.

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     Details                                                              

SCHOLARSHIPS -A CASE STUDY.   

Implementation of scholarship schemes has been full of uncertainties and aberrations for the last many years. The State has mainly been implementing: (1) ‘scheme of pre-matric scholarships to the students belonging to scheduled castes and children of parents/guardian who are engaged in unclean and hazardous occupations’ with the objective of promoting literacy in uninterrupted education at the pre-matric level and (2) ‘scheme of post matric scholarships to the students of scheduled castes’ with the objective to appreciably increase the gross enrollment ratio of SC students in higher education. These  are centrally sponsored schemes with budget sharing pattern of 90:10 of Central and State Government  in relation to first scheme and 60:40 with regard to the second.

These scholarship schemes mainly provide financial assistance to match tuition fees, admission fees, examination fees, registration fees, IT fees etc of the students and in case of hostelers maintenance allowance, additionally. They do not take into consideration other charges like development fees, library fees, building funds and the like. Barring exceptions, rates of scholarships range from Rs 625/- to 7000/- for day scholars and 1875/- to 13500/- for hostelers per annum depending upon classes and courses of the beneficiaries. The amount is very meager and there is urgent need to enhance the rates at realistic cost of education. Many States provide realistic financial back up for educating the deprived and downtrodden. For example, Karnataka, Punjab, Telangana provide assistance upto one crore, twenty five lacs and twenty lacs respectively, for overseas study of such students.

There was organised scam from the year 2009-10 to 2016-17 where approximately two hundred and fifty crores of scholarship money was siphoned out and grabbed by private Institutions and Universities in and outside the State. The scam was busted in the year 2018 by the whistle blowers and first FIR was filed on 16.11.2018. The case was then handed over to the CBI and second FIR was filed by the CBI on 19.05.2019.  

It remains to be seen as to what happens to this case. But there is other aspect of the scam which has been completely ignored. Nearly 2.38 lakh  boys and girls in whose names the scholarship amounts have been drawn by the scammers did not get the money- neither will they be eligible for such concessions in future.  Therefore it is loss of opportunities for them. No thought has been given as to how they should be compensated. Such deprivation is sinning without sin.

Post scam period also saw difficult time to a large number of SC students because of the following factors:

1.   Financial year 2018-19:

ü  No budget was allocated by the State Government for pre-matric scholarship scheme and therefore no central assistance was released. Consequently 24058 eligible students did not get scholarship.

ü  1962 eligible students did not get post matric scholarship.

2.   Financial year 2019-20:

ü  No budget was allocated by the State Government for pre-matric scholarship scheme and therefore no central assistance was released. Consequently 20436 eligible students did not get scholarship.

ü  2228 eligible students did not get post matric scholarship.

3.   Financial year 2020-21:

ü  No budget was allocated by the State Government for pre-matric scholarship scheme. 6183 eligible students did not get scholarship.

ü  1126 eligible students did not get post matric scholarship.

4.   Financial year 2021-22:

ü  No budget was allocated by the State Government for post-matric scholarship scheme. Liabilities cleared from the budget of 2022-23.

5.   Financial year 2022-23:

ü  Scholarship not released to 19691 eligible students of pre-matric stage and to 22804 of post matric courses till March 2023.

 

6.   No post matric scholarship was provided to the students of professional courses in the medical colleges during the last seven  years.

7.   Schedules for release of scholarships have not been followed in the cases where scholarships were disbursed.

8.   There is pattern in aberrations.

          Such troubles and errors in the Scholarship front definitely factor in the drop outs of the deprived students. We have not come across any independent  study on implication of erratic scholarships on dropouts, inter alia, in Himachal; however, status of dropouts of students belonging to weaker sections from Central Universities, IITs & IIMs for the last five years are as follows:

 

Institutions	SC	ST	OBC	Total
Central Universities	2424	2622	4596	9642
Indian Institutes of Technology	1068	408	2066	3542
Indian Institutes of Management	188	91	163	442
Grand total	3680	3121	6825	13626

Independent study shows that poverty and lack of sustained financial  back up largely contribute to such dropouts.

 Moot points in scholarship front

l  To what extent  the existing schemes have proved a game changer.

l  Necessity to have need based and cost of education based scholarship schemes.

l  Extension of scope of schemes including for overseas studies.