Announcing the launch of the election promise of TRS to provide free and compulsory education from kindergarten to post-graduation, Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao has said 250 institutions will be started for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and minorities this year as part of the programme.
Of them, 100 schools will be added to the institutions run by Social Welfare Residential Educational Institutions Society. They will commence academic activity from June or one or two months later if the project was delayed, Mr. Rao said after laying the foundation stone for the 125 feet bronze statue of B.R. Ambedkar in NTR Gardens here on the occasion of the 125{+t}{+h}birth anniversary of the latter.
The government will also start 25 residential degree colleges for girls and five colleges for boys under the aegis of the same society. Fifty residential schools for STs and 70 of them for minorities make up the full compliment of 250 institutions which will take off under the KG to PG programme of the government, he added.
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He said the recruitment of teachers for the schools and colleges will be taken up before the institutions begin academic work. It was decided to start residential colleges, particularly for girls, because SC students from rural background do not get rented accommodation in towns and cities to pursue education after Intermediate due to the stigma attached to them owing to caste affiliation.
Mr. Rao also promised hike in scholarship for overseas studies from Rs 10 lakh to 20 lakh. Among other promises he made were funding for startup contractors belonging to SCs who are undergoing training in National Academy of Construction to purchase machinery like JCBs, poclains and dumpers for starting career.