By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, Nov 30: State BJP vice president and Tura MDC, Bernard N. Marak, has called on Chief Minister Conrad Sangma to ensure that Scheduled Tribe students receive the full sanctioned amount under the Umbrella Scholarship Scheme, saying that anything less is unfair to the beneficiaries.
Marak said the chief minister should treat the full disbursal as an advance Christmas entitlement for students, asserting that giving less than the actual amount is unjust and could amount to atrocities against ST students. He stated that many students in Garo Hills received reduced amounts, and this, he said, undermined the chief minister’s effort to publicly showcase the release of the scholarship.
He further said that a letter has been sent to the Ministry of Tribal Affairs to verify the sanctioned figures and to seek clarity on why Meghalaya’s ST students receive their
scholarship in instalments and why previous years’ sanctioned amounts did not match the sums credited to students.
Marak added that last year, the mandatory Direct Benefit Transfer system was not enabled despite students having Aadhaar-linked bank accounts. He maintained that the government must clarify the actual scholarship amounts due to students or risk being seen as committing atrocities against ST students.
