No scholarship fund, degrees withheld in Punjab
Deepkamal Kaur
Tribune News Service
Jalandhar, December 31
Nearly 50,000 Dalit students are bearing the brunt of the ongoing stand-off between the Punjab Government and private colleges over non-disbursement of SC post-matric scholarship funds.
Enrolment Dips
- As per the Joint Association of Colleges, there has been a constant fall in enrolments under the SC post-matric scholarship scheme
- From 3.25 lakh admissions in 2016-17, the number came down to 2.15 lakh in 2019-20. The same is estimated to be around 90,000 this session
Many students have not got their degrees for the past over three years. Agitated over the delay, about 60 students of the local CT Institute allegedly locked the campus yesterday and burnt photographs displayed in the reception area. The management admitted that it had withheld 1,100 degrees since 2017 as Rs 39 crore was due towards SC students.
Members of the Joint Association of Colleges (JAC) today held a meeting with the local administration. JAC president Jagjit Singh said the Jalandhar Deputy Commissioner had assured them that he would take up the matter with the government.
He, however, said: “We will not give degrees till we get our dues. We want the students to protest against the state government, not us”. The JAC, which represents 1,650 colleges of Punjab, has been openly telling Dalit students to clear the dues to get their degrees. JAC chief patron Satnam Singh Sandhu and chairman Dr Gurmeet Singh Dhaliwal said they had met the minister concerned and other authorities, but to no avail. An amount of Rs 1,850 crore was due for which there had been no assurance either from the state or the Centre, they said.
