Scholarship of Rs 344 cr distributed to 82 lakh students last session

Scholarship worth Rs  344 crore was distributed to about 82 lakh students of Class I to XII of Government and non-government schools under the Integrated Scholarship Scheme in the last academic session in State. This amount was deposited online in the accounts of students by the School Education Department.

As per the resolution passed in the Vidhan Sabha in connection with Integrated Social Security Programme, the School Education Department has been given the responsibility of approval and distribution of 30 types of scholarships of 8 departments of the state government to the students. The Department has prepared a Samagra Shiksha Portal with the help of NIC. Through this portal, the date of registered students is being collected. As per the criteria of various scholarship schemes, this portal is fixing the eligiblity for the scholarship and making payment online. Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan distributed the scholarship amount simultaneously in the accounts of about 50 lakh students through Mission One Click in the last academic session. This process of approval and payment of the sholarship is the best example of DBT (Direct Benefit Transfer) in the state. The database available on the portal will be used to transfer the amount of the schemes for scholarship besides distribution of cycles, laptops and uniforms to meritorious students into their bank accounts.

The budget of School Education was Rs 1,745 crore in the year 2003-04 which was 8.69 per cent of the total budget of the state. In the year 2017-18, the budget of the School Education Department has increased to nearly Rs 19,873 crore. This is 10.71 per cent of the total budget of the state. Concerted efforts are being made to improve the quality of school education with the enhanced budget amount.