Kyndiah announces sops for ST students

Shillong, Jul 7 (UNI) The Ministry of Tribal Affairs has launched a new scholarship scheme of top class education for students belonging to Scheduled Tribe category.

Announcing the slews of scholarship for tribal students here today, Union Tribal Affairs Minister P R Kyndiah said the scheme is aimed at encouraging meritorious students for pursuing studies at graduate and postgraduate level in any of the identified instutitutes.

The ministry has identified 127 institutes to be covered by the scheme which includes both government and private covering the files of management, medicine, engineering, law and commercial courses, he said.

Mr Kyndiah said that each institute has been allotted five awards, with a ceiling of 635 scholarships per year for which the annual family income should not exceed Rs 2 lakh.

In the scheme, the students are awarded scholarship covering full tuition fee and other non-refundable dues in respect of government or government funded institutions, he said.

Mr Kyndiah, however, said there is a ceiling of Rs 2 lakh per annum per student for private sector institutions and Rs 3.72 lakh per annum per student for the private sector flying clubs for commercial pilots training.

Under the scholarship, Mr Kyndiah said living expenses, books and stationery and a computer system would be provided as one time assistance during the course. Under the top class education scheme, grants were released to 23 institutes benefiting 79 students in the first year of the operation of the scheme.

Besides the scheme, the Tribal Affairs minister also announced the Rajiv Gandhi National Fellowship (RGNF) scheme to provide fellowships in the form of financial assistance to students belonging to the scheduled tribes to pursue higher studies.

The fellowship under RGNF is on the pattern of UGC fellowships awarded to research students pursuing regular and full time M.Phil and Ph.D courses, Mr Kyndiah said.

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