Following criticism from student groups, the state government has rolled back some of the 'restrictive' conditions to avail its scholarship for the marginalised students aspiring to study abroad. It has also decided to provide doctoral fellowships for all eligible applicants, though the aid amount has been halved. Through a government resolution (GR) issued on Thursday, the state brought down the qualifying score in college exams for overseas education aspirants from 75% to 55%, less than even the earlier 60% threshold.
It also did away with the Rs30 lakh and Rs40 lakh cap on the scholarship amount for the master's and PhD students respectively. A clause preventing those availing of the scheme in their master's programmes from getting the benefits again for their PhDs has also been withdrawn. The number of beneficiaries from one family has been increased from one to two.
The study abroad scholarships are provided to students belonging to Scheduled Caste (SC), Scheduled Tribe (ST), Other Backward Class (OBC), Economically Backward Category (EBC) and MarathaKunbi communities whose family income is less than Rs8 lakh. The state has also extended the scheme for students from religious minority groups, with the number of beneficiaries increased from 27 announced last year to 75.
The new clauses were introduced last year as part of a policy to bring uniformity to various welfare programmes meant for students from different communities. The conditions were, however, criticised by the aspirants and activists, who argued that the 75% criteria is unreasonable as the grading system is not uniform across all universities in the state.
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They also pointed out that the minimum score requirement in foreign universities ranges from 50% to 60%, much lower than the state's criterion. The government also sought to bring relief to the beneficiaries of its fellowship programme, under which marginalised students pursuing PhD get a monthly stipend of Rs31,000 for the first two years and Rs35,000 per month for another three years.
According to the GR, the state has decided to give the scheme benefits to all of the current 3,545 applicant research scholars deemed eligible. However, they will only 50% of the stipend amount. For the subsequent academic years, the government has decided to increase the number of beneficiaries for each of margnailised groups - SCs, OBCs and Marathas - from 200 to 300. The number of fellowships for ST category has been doubled from 100 to 200
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