Congress alleges discrepancies

RELEASE OF FUND FOR OVERSEAS STUDIES SCHEME

Hyderabad: Leader of the Opposition in Telangana Legislative Council Mohammed Ali Shabbir asked Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao to remove the ‘discrepancies and delays’ in the release of funds for overseas study scheme, fee reimbursement and scholarships schemes for students of Minority communities.

The senior Congress leader addressed a letter to the Chief Minister in this regard on Saturday. He stated that the discrepancies and delays in the implementation of overseas study scheme, fee reimbursement and scholarships schemes were causing hardship to thousands of students and parents of Minority communities in the State.

Alleging that the Minorities Welfare Department was yet to release the first instalment of Rs 5 lakh each to the selected candidates,

Shabbir Ali pointed out that as against the claims of successful implementation of overseas study scheme, several parents were complaining that the officials concerned were delaying the release of first installment on one pretext or the other.

So far, the first instalment of Rs 5 lakh has not been deposited in the accounts of 228 selected candidates. Although a deadline for the release of first instalment was set as November 10, it did not happen and new conditions were imposed.

In the wake of the selection of candidates under overseas study scheme, their parents mobilised money from various sources to send their children abroad for higher studies.

For release of first instalment, the candidates were asked to submit online admission card of the university and the boarding card of airlines and so on. Instead of releasing the funds after these submissions, the officials of the Minorities Welfare Department imposed a new condition of submission of an affidavit on the authenticity of their certificates.

The Congress leader stated that the new condition was illogical as the candidates were selected under the scheme by the State government and the universities for admission only after they verified all certificates and found them to be genuine. Although the students had no objection in giving an affidavit, they would not get a stamp paper abroad, he pointed out.

The students would have to approach the Indian Embassy in those countries to send the affidavit by getting it duly attested. This was creating new problems for the students and their parents, he said. He also said several students had complained of non-receipt of post-metric scholarships for day scholars and hostel inmates for the year 2014-15. In some cases, a part of amount had been released.

For instance, instead of releasing Rs 1,820 for 10 months, only Rs 1,638 has been released. For the year 2014-15, the State government has allocated Rs 425 crore towards fee reimbursement and Rs 100 crore for scholarships.

However, so far, the colleges had been paid only Rs 85.54 crore in two instalments while only Rs 23 crore has been released towards scholarships.