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Thousands of students who received scholarships under Tamil Nadu’s SC, ST and Special Scholarship for Converted Christians (SCC) schemes between 2017 and 2022 dropped out or were excluded from the schemes in subsequent years, says data. A large number of eligible students were also never considered for the scholarship.
This data, furnished as part of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India’s (CAG) performance audit report, pointed to significant gaps in the Tamil Nadu government’s ability to track beneficiaries, identify vulnerable students and ensure that scholarship support reached those entitled to it.
Notably, the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) was in power from 2016 to 2021, while the MK Stalin-led Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) took over in 2021. The report covers the time period from 2017 to 2022.
In the CAG’s sampled institutions, 2,901 SC/ST students who had received Pre-Matric or Post-Matric scholarships subsequently dropped out or were excluded from renewal between 2017 and 2022/23. This included 2,690 Scheduled Caste (SC) students – 1488 in pre-matric and 1202 in post-matric, as well as 211 Scheduled Tribe (ST) students – 147 in pre-matric and 64 in post-matric.
The state-wide database showed the scale was considerably larger, with 13993 SC pre-matric, 37553 SC post-matric, 1966 ST pre-matric and 2013 ST post-matric students dropping out or not having their scholarships renewed.
Additionally, a substantial proportion of eligible students were never covered by the schemes. In eight sampled districts, an average of 46% of schools did not avail of the pre-matric scholarship, and 39% did not avail of the post-matric scholarship for SC/ST students during 2019-22.
The proportion of potentially eligible students left out was particularly high among ST beneficiaries. For pre-matric scholarships, the exclusion ranged from 35% to 55% for ST students and 21% to 52% for SC students. For post-matric scholarships, the corresponding gaps were 30%-42% for ST students and 20%-29% for SC students.
The CAG report also noted that despite scheme guidelines requiring proactive identification of poor and eligible households, no special campaigns were conducted to identify students from the poorest sections.