In what appears to be a pre-poll bonanza, the Odisha government has announced an annual scholarship for approximately 4,50,000 undergraduate and 32,000 postgraduate students, which comes just a day after the announcement of a ₹1 lakh interest-free loan for 1,00,000 unemployed rural youths in the State.
V. K. Pandian, Chairman of the 5-T Initiative, participated in Nua-O, a youth empowerment programme, in Jajpur district. “Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has taken a decision that minimum scholarship of ₹9,000 per year for male, and ₹10,000 per year for a female student pursuing higher education, will be given,” he said. Students belonging Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes will receive an additional ₹1,000 over and above the fixed scholarship.
“All students are eligible for the scholarships except the students whose parents are Income Tax payee or permanent government employees. The Nua-O scholarships for current academic year will be deposited in the bank accounts of the eligible students from February 20 onwards and completed this month itself,” the Chief Minister’s Office said in a statement.
Moreover, a Nua-O Corpus fund of ₹300 crore will be instituted from the coming academic year. Students who will excel in academic and different co-curricular activities will receive a higher amount as scholarship from this corpus fund, he said.
By August, the ‘Nua-O Magic Smart Card’ will be given to all eligible students, which will help them avail additional benefits, including bus and train travel, free WiFi, access to online courses, skill development, and coaching programmes based on performance and participation in various academic and extra-curricular activities.
The scholarship schemes will be applicable for general degree and post graduate programmes for students studying in State universities, government and non-government aided colleges, including Sanskrit Colleges under the Higher Education Department.
“This will be a new era of student empowerment envisioned by the Odisha CM, who always motive students to dream big and work hard to realise it,” Mr. Pandian said.
The State Cabinet chaired by Mr. Patnaik on Monday had approved a one-time livelihood assistance of ₹1,000 in cash to each of the 95,90,526 families covered under the Public Distribution System. A new scheme, ‘Swayam’, also secured the approval of the Cabinet. In this new scheme, ₹1 lakh of interest-free bank loans will be provided to all rural unemployed youths aged between 18-35 years (18-40 years for special categories) without any outstanding loans from Central and State government-supported schemes for starting new business ventures.
