Applications of students from minority community: ‘Pending verification’, over 1,000 girls miss scholarship

Chaki said that the individual status of the applications of the students on the portal said “verification pending”, leaving no option for the students to seek remedy.

In its reply to Chaki, the MAEF said that it received 2.82 lakh applications from across the country through the national scholarship portal for the Begum Hazrat Mahal National Scholarship Scheme for the financial year 2021-’22, of which 4,362 are pending verification. Out of these, 1,019 applications are from Gujarat.

“The Foundation received 9,150 applications from Gujarat, of which verifications for 1,019 were not completed at the level of the district nodal officer (DNO)… The foundation has made necessary follow-ups with the state governments for timely completion of the verification… Necessary follow-up has also been made with the DNOs where it was possible… The MAEF has no authority to take action against the DNOs,” said MAEF in response to queries posed by Chaki under RTI.

The Director of the Developing Castes Welfare (DCW), Gujarat, also stated in the RTI reply that it received 9,150 applications for the Begum Hazrat Mahal Scholarship in the state, of which 5,381 were approved by the DNOs. “For the academic year 2021-22, 1,098 applications from female students of the minority community were not verified,” it said. The RTI reply does not specify the reason for pending verification or action taken.

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According to Chaki, the remaining 2,671 applications out of 9,150 may have been unprocessed at the school level. “Some parents are not able to furnish all the required documents… Once the application has reached the DNO level, the officer only has to verify if the submission is complete and forward it to the foundation. Even if the DNO thinks the application is unfit, it should be rejected and not reflect as a process pending,” Chaki said.

The scholarships portal of India, for instance, shows the application status of one of the students from Khambhalkiya from Devbhumi Dwarka district as “Application under process for verification with district nodal officer”. The verification details include a positive verification by the high school from where the student has applied for the scholarship as well as a verified Aadhaar. The portal also states that the application was not found to be a duplicate in the system and no scholarship amount has been processed for the applicant.

Joint Director of DCW, Gujarat, Hitendra Vaghani, told this newspaper, “There are many cases from schools where the beneficiaries apply for multiple scholarship programmes… when such an application arrives at the DNO level, and it is seen that the beneficiary has received another scholarship, the application is left unprocessed… It is not rejected, technically. There is no other reason for the pending numbers.”

Chaki, however, said that there are no other scholarships at the central and state level that girl students of the minority community from Class 9 to 12 can apply for. Chaki said, “The MAEF scholarships are on the National Scholarship portal. Any student can choose only one scholarship during the application and  it is not possible to avail of another scholarship… The Central scholarship does not have any conditions that the student could not avail of any other scholarship offered by the state. Genuine applications should be verified and forwarded or at least a remedy should be available. We are in the process of seeking legal opinion in this matter.”