Mumbai: The State government will be disbursing funds under the Government of India Post Matriculate Scholarship (GoI-PMS) to the students of the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) who come from communities falling in the Scheduled Tribes (ST) category and domiciled in the State.
The Tribal Development Department has written to the Union Ministry of Tribal Affairs stating that TISS will be made eligible for the GoI-PMS, and applications of 2017-18 are being processed. The letter said scholarships will be disbursed to eligible students within 15 days.
The State government had deemed ST students from the state studying at TISS ineligible for scholarship on the grounds that TISS was a private deemed university. “Since 2011, the Tribal Development Department officials in Mumbai and Tuljapur had stopped accepting scholarships applications of ST students from Maharashtra on the grounds that we were a private deemed university. However, today’s letter makes it clear that the department has recognised our status as a centrally funded deemed university,” Prof. Vijay Raghavan, Dean, Social Protection Office, TISS, said.
The letter said deemed universities were ineligible for fee reimbursement. However, the department said it was extending the benefit to TISS as it is wholly funded by the Central government through the University Grants Commission. It added that arrears in scholarships are being processed, and the fee structure has been approved. Reimbursements, it said, will be made accordingly.
