Bhubaneswar: Female students receiving annual scholarships or financial assistance of Rs 18,000 or more from any state or central government scheme will not be eligible for Subhadra Yojana, the fund transfer scheme of Mohan Majhi government in Odisha.
The Women and Child Development department has issued a letter to the Higher Education and the ST&SC Development departments, seeking comprehensive data of students above 21 years of age, who are receiving scholarships exceeding Rs 18,000 in a single financial year for 2023–24 and 2024–25.
“As per Subhadar guidelines, the applicant’s age should be 21 years or more and less than 60 years as on the qualifying date. Further, any woman receiving financial assistance of Rs. 18,000 per annum or more under any state or central government scheme would be ineligible,” the letter read.
It further noted that arrear-based disbursements are to be excluded, and the data is to be provided in the format specified by the Women and Child Development department.
The departmental director further mentioned about grievances of the students stating that scholarship amounts are primarily used for academic purposes and do not serve as additional financial support. “To examine the matter in detail, it is requested to furnish the number of girl students aged 21 years and above (as per the given format) who have received scholarship amount of 18,000 or more in a single financial year, based on normative criteria (excluding arrear-based disbursements), for the Financial Years 2023-24 and 2024-25,” it added.
The Odisha government has provided three instalments of Rs 5,000 each to over 1 crore women in Odisha under this scheme.
Earlier, 36,702 beneficiaries were excluded as they had purchased vehicles, 21,035 were left out as they had paid income tax and another 1,33,691 for being registered as paddy sellers and farmers.