Budget’s pro-Dalit tilt in poll season no surprise

JALANDHAR: It seemed to be a day to lure the Dalit community in the state. If the BSP chief Mayawati and AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal were in Doaba to play the Dalit card, the ruling SAD-BJP government too did not lag behind in wooing the SCs of the state today by announcing an array schemes for them in the Punjab budget today.

Deepkamal Kaur

Tribune news service

Jalandhar, March 15

It seemed to be a day to lure the Dalit community in the state. If the BSP chief Mayawati and AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal were in Doaba to play the Dalit card, the ruling SAD-BJP government too did not lag behind in wooing the SCs of the state today by announcing an array schemes for them in the Punjab budget today.

The announcement of allocation of Rs 100 crore corpus as SC scholarship fund to be given to the universities and institutes on behalf of the SC students and doling out of interest-free study loan of upto Rs 5 lakh for the youth from economically weaker section is being seen as a step in the same direction.

Akali CPS and SC leader Pawan Tinu, who has been raking up the issue in Assembly, makes his point. “We know that the Dalit students in Doaba have been sufferers owing to delay of disbursement of funds, especially since a recent judgement in favour of the college managements. The state contribution for Centre’s Post Matric Scholarship Scheme stood at Rs 68 crore for six years even as the number of beneficiaries under the scheme had risen from 35,000 to 3.75 lakh. I had been pressing for some relief for them in one way or the other. Now Punjab government would be able to disburse the funds to the colleges from this corpus till the time Centre releases its grant. After the funds reach the colleges, this amount would be withdrawn.” He even hailed the starting of interest-free loan scheme for poor students.

Congress MLA from Banga Tirlochan Singh Soondh, however, termed the announcement as just as another lollipop. “It will meet the same fate as the government’s other welfare schemes including shagun scheme. The SAD-BJP MLAs including Som Parkash, Nirmal Singh and Pawan Tinu have themselves admitted to corruption in the SC Post Matric Scholarship Scheme. This government only wants the poor people to keep standing before them asking for atta-daal, uniforms and books and ultimately would give out nothing”, he reacted.

AAP leader and Dalit activist Paramjit Singh Kainth too alleged that it was a gimmick to play with the sentiments of the Dalits, who comprise one-third of the voters, in the election year. “Were they sleeping for nine years when the 5000 dummy SC admissions were happening for siphoning off of funds?”, he commented.