The Ministry of Minority Affairs implements three Scholarship Schemes viz. Pre-Matric, Post-Matric and Merit-cum-Means based Scholarship Schemes for the educational empowerment of students belonging to economically weaker sections of the six notified minority communities i.e. Buddhist, Christian, Jain, Muslim, Parsi and Sikh in all States/UTs across the country. A total of thirty (30) lakh Pre-Matric, 5 lakh Post Matric and 60,000 Merit-cum-Means scholarships are targeted to be distributed as ‘Fresh’ Scholarships every year, besides, Renewal scholarships. The three scholarship schemes are being implemented through the National Scholarship Portal (NSP) and are being disbursed under direct benefit transfer (DBT) mode to improve the efficiency and bring transparency by removing duplicity and stopping pilferages.
The details of number of applications received, verified by States/UTs and sanctioned by the Ministry of Minority Affairs under the above mentioned schemes during 2016-17 to 2021-22 are as under:
Year | Pre-Matric Scholarship |
| ||||
Number of verified applications received | Number of applications Sanctioned |
| ||||
2016-17 | 74,25,553 | 41,53,524 |
| |||
2017-18 | 85,70,708 | 53,11,257 |
| |||
2018-19 | 86,88,465 | 56,91,854 |
| |||
2019-20 | 70,84,410 | 55,68,025 |
| |||
2020-21* | 60,38,248 | 52,29,148 |
| |||
2021-22** | 78,29,283 | 24,05,498 |
| |||
Total | 4,56,36,667 | 2,83,59,306 |
| |||
Post-Matric Scholarship Scheme |
| |||||
| 2016-17 | 13,65,838 | 6,24,990 | |||
| 2017-18 | 14,07,780 | 6,98,069 | |||
| 2018-19 | 12,80,958 | 6,84,265 | |||
| 2019-20 | 11,24,202 | 7,43,141 | |||
| 2020-21* | 11,61,252 | 6,62,912 | |||
| 2021-22** | 9,91,534 | 1,38,105 | |||
| Total | 73,31,564 | 35,51,482 | |||
| Merit-cum-Means based Scholarship Scheme | |||||
| 2016-17 | 189584 | 121937 | |||
| 2017-18 | 180421 | 119472 | |||
| 2018-19 | 180274 | 117771 | |||
| 2019-20 | 145398 | 118359 | |||
| 2020-21* | 137340 | 120208 | |||
| 2021-22** | 118351 | 52720 | |||
| Total | 9,51,368 | 6,50,467 | |||
* Disbursement of Scholarships for 2020-21 continues in 2021-22.
** It includes sanction for finally verified renewal applications of 2021-22 only. Disbursement for fresh application 2021-22 is yet to begin.
(d): The details of budget allocated and released under the above mentioned schemes from 2016-17 to 2021-22 are as under:-
(In ₹ Crore)
Scheme | Pre-Matric | Post Matric | Merit-Cum-Means | |||
Year | Budget Allocated | Amount Released | Budget Allocated | Amount Released | Budget Allocated | Amount Released |
2016-17 | 931.00 | 585.94 | 550.00 | 287.11 | 335.00 | 220.54 |
2017-18 | 950.00 | 1108.13 | 550.00 | 479.72 | 393.54 | 388.79 |
2018-19 | 980.00 | 1176.19 | 692.00 | 354.89 | 522.00 | 261.17 |
2019-20 | 1220.30 | 1324.84 | 496.01 | 428.77 | 366.43 | 285.63 |
2020-21 | 1330.00 | 1325.54 | 535.00 | 512.81 | 400.00 | 396.34 |
2021-22 | 1378.00 | 474.52* | 468.00 | 80.58* | 325.00 | 134.09* |
Total | 6789.30 | 5995.16 | 3291.01 | 2143.88 | 2341.97 | 1686.56 |
*Expenditure as on 31.01.2022.
