HRD Ministry’s scholarship scheme faces roadblock

Vikram Sharma

Tribune News Services

Jammu, October 23

The state government’s initiative to seed bank accounts with the Aadhaar number for direct benefit transfer of scholarships provided by the Ministry of Human Resource Development and the UGC is facing roadblocks.

While the national e-scholarship portal of the Centre misses out on many faculties, students claimed that they could not avail themselves of the benefits of scholarships because of the delay in correction of Aadhaar cards.

Acknowledging the faulty character of the portal, a head of the department at the University of Jammu said that he had come across many such complaints last year also.

“There is no specific mention of most of the faculties on the portal. Students are left confused how to fill in the form online. Many log in on the wrong faculty, creating more confusion,” he said.

He further said that keeping in view the grievance of the students, he had approached Vice Chancellor RD Sharma and had got one-time settlement of the scholarships manually last year.

Prof Jigar Mohammad, Dean, Research Studies, University of Jammu, said he was making concerted efforts to rectify the faulty structure of the portal and make it student savvy soon.

“We have received complaints from scholars and students that they are finding online uploading of applications cumbersome. I am on the job to rectify the fault and the system would be made easy for the students,” the Dean said.

He appealed to the students and scholars, facing difficulty, to approach him so that he can help them.

Meanwhile, the national e-scholarship portal has asked the students without Aadhaar number to register on the portal with enrolment number or the bank account number with the IFSC code as an identifier.

The last date of registration/submission has been extended from September 30 to October 31.

As per the Higher Education Department, from the financial year 2016-17 onwards, students were asked to apply for the Central scholarship scheme through the national e-scholarship portal using Aadhaar-seeded bank accounts for direct benefit transfer.