Minister Of Minority Affairs Informs On The Discontinuation Of Scholarships For Minority Students
The minister of minority affairs Kiren Rijiju in answer to the unstarred- question raised by Dr John Brittas concerning the discontinuation of scholarships for minority students in the last five years, the number of beneficiaries impacted by the decision, and category-wise detail of the schemes provided to them put the important details in the upper house of the Parliament or Rajya Sabha.
The minister replied that the Ministry of Minority Affairs implements various schemes for the socio-economic empowerment of the six (6) centrally notified minority communities including Muslims, Jains, Sikhs, Parsis, Christians, and Buddhists. During the last five years, the ministry has implemented 3 scholarship schemes under (i) Pre-Matric, (ii) Post-Matric (iii) Merit-cum-Means based scholarships for students belonging to minority communities.
The Right to Education (RTE) Act, of 2009 makes it an obligation for the government to provide free and compulsory elementary education for students from classes I to VIII. So, students who study in classes 9 to 10 are covered under the Pre-Matric scholarship Scheme of other ministries and departments. Similarly from 2022-23, the Pre-Matric Scholarships of the Ministry of Minority Affairs have been restricted to the students from class 9 to 10 only.
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The minister further replied that the Post Matric Scheme covers students from class 11 to PhD. and the Merit-cum-Means based Scholarship scheme covers technical and professional courses.
Additionaly, the minister also said that the Begum Hazrat Mahal National Scholarship Scheme (BHMNS) scheme which targets the girl child of class 9 to 12 has also been subsumed with the Pre-Matric and Post-Matric scheme, since 2022-23.
In his replay to the question asked by John Brittas, minister also provided details of the students who were benefitted under the Pre-Matric Scholarhsips Schemes. A total of 46,63,073 students were benefitted in 2021-22 which is higher than the last years 42,34,799 students.
