Union Minister of State for Social Justice and Empowerment A. Narayanaswamy said in the Lok Sabha on Tuesday that the Central government stopped pre-matric scholarship for Scheduled Caste students for three years (2017, 2018 and 2019). It allotted ₹120. 23 crore for the post-matric scholarship scheme in 2020-21, as against ₹743.24 crore in 2016-17, ₹434.48 crore in 2017-18, ₹1,407.38 crore in 2018-19 and ₹935.84 crore in 2019-20.
He was responding to Villupuram MP D. Ravikumar, who sought details of the total expenditure incurred by the Centre over the last five years for pre-matric and post-matric scholarships for Scheduled Caste students.
The Minister’s response to a question on the National Overseas Scholarship Scheme revealed that only ₹75.50 crore was allotted over the last five years.
The Minister listed the reasons for the new guidelines for the scheme. “This department reviews the National Overseas Scholarship Scheme guidelines from time to time, and has carried out many significant changes for simplifying the procedures and proper implementation. This year too, revisions were carried out after due consideration. The number of seats has been increased from 100 to 125 from 2021-22. The Budget outlay has also increased to ₹35 crore and in the recent years, unlike earlier, a larger percentage of awardees have travelled abroad under the scheme,” he said.
