IF the United Progressive Alliance ‘report to the people 2010-11’ is to be believed,minorities in the country are flooded with funds beyond what they could even have imagined.
According the report jointly released by UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and prime minister Dr Manmohan Singh on Sunday evening, the minorities in the country have got over Rs ` 1,28,300 crore of bank credit in 2010-11 (up to December 10).
“Over` 1,28,300 crore of bank credit was provided to the minorities in 2010-11 (upto December, 2010)” said the report. In the same period 308 public sector bank branches were opened in districts with a substantial minority population. The National Minority Finance Development Corporation (NMFDC) itself has disbursed ` 233.27 crore for assisting 1,58, 084 minority beneficiaries during 2010-11. The capital of NMFDC has been raised to ` 1500 crore in the same period.
On the educational filed under Prime Minister’s New 15-Point Programme for the Welfare of Minorities, more than 4,100 primary and upper primary schools were constructed, over 13,300 such schools were opened, 25,600 additional class rooms were constructed and over 30,759 teachers sanctioned in blocks and districts having a substantial minority population during 2010-11.
The report said that 60 Industrial Training Institutes, located in minority concentration districts have been upgraded into centres of excellence and the corpus of the Maulana Azad Education Foundation was raised by ` 125 crore and now stands at ` 550 crore.
It said that 44.21 lakhs scholarships were given to children belonging to the minority communities for their pre-matric education. An amount of ` 446.25 crore was spent on this during 2010-11,. About 48% of the pre-matric scholarships were awarded to girls. Under the post-matric scholarship scheme, 5.26 lakhs scholarships were awarded at a cost of ` 228.97 crore.
“Under the Meritorious Scholarship Scheme for girl students in class XI and XII of the Maulana Azad Education Foundation sanctioned 17,326 scholarships at a cost of` 20.79 crore”, the report said adding that 757 fellowships were awarded at a cost of ` 14.90 crore. 30% of the fellowships were awarded to women scholars. During 2010-11, ` 14.37 crore was released for enhancing the skills and knowledge of students and candidates belonging to the minority communities for improving their prospect of employment in government service and private sector employment and also for admission in technical and professional courses. On housing front construction of over 3.63 lakhs Indira Awas Yojana houses for minorities was also taken up during this period.
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