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Students from various
parts of Mumbai took part in the protest held in Mumbai on June 19 |
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 Hundreds appear for IRF scholarship exams despite
soaring temperature:
Muslim students beat the
soaring temperature in Maharashtra when they appear in a large
number for the Islamic .....
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Mumbai:
Mumbai Division of the Students Islamic Organisation of India (SIO)
organized a protest demonstration yesterday at Azad Maidan against,
what they call, the lethargic and step-motherly approach of the
State Government.
Students from every nook and corners
of Mumbai gathered at the venue in large numbers to express their
anger against Govt.
“Due to the lethargic attitude of the Congress-NCP government and
the callous attitude of the authorities towards minorities, the
amount of Rs 15 Crore which is transferred from central Government
for clear sanctioned applications, is still lying in the Bank of
Maharashtra” said ADIL [PR secretary, SIO Maharashtra] while
speaking to Media on the occasion.
'The Issue'
According to the SIO press release, the Central
Government had allocated 64,400 scholarships for the students of
minority communities in Maharashtra under the post-matric
scholarship scheme for the year 2009-10. But, due to improper and
poor publicity of the scheme by the Government of Maharashtra, only
24,064 applications were received by the administration.
After due verification and scrutiny of
the applications by the Directorate of Higher Education the data of
the students as well as proposal was sent to the Ministry of
Minority Affairs. Later, the Central Government cleared Rs 15 crore
for the scheme in the state. Ideally and legally, the respective
amounts should have been transferred to the students by the month of
April 2010. But due to the lethargic attitude of the Congress-NCP
government and the callous attitude of the authorities towards
minorities, the amount of Rs 15 crore is still lying in the Bank of
Maharashtra, says the statement.
The release further says, the information from the Directorate of
Higher Education has revealed that the Director of Higher Education
has constituted an inquiry committee for cross checking the
students’ details, despite the fact that the Central Government had
cleared the data. The committee has also reduced the scholarship
amount to the students awarded scholarships. The amount of
scholarship has been reduced to just Rs 1400 despite the fact that
the central government had approved Rs 7,000 to the same students.
This unconstitutional and illegal interference by the Director shows
bias towards the minorities.
Also, the committee has created a
difference of over Rs 3 crores in the funds received from the
Central Government. This again proves the ill intentions of the
authorities. Does this mean that the proposal submitted by the
Director of Higher Education to the Central Government was fake? The
same scheme has been successfully implemented in the states of Bihar
and Uttar Pradesh which are comparatively considered to be backward
states. Why has the scheme been made unsuccessful in the state of
Maharashtra?, ask the SIO leaders in their press statement.
'Demands'
Elaborating their demands, the release says, Students Islamic
Organization of India (SIO) demands that the Government makes a free
and fair inquiry into the matter and arrest and prosecute the
officials incharge who are misusing their positions and taking
unconstitutional and illegal steps.
Also, the list of students, to whom
the scholarship has been approved by the Central Government, be made
public and the amount received from the Central Government be
transferred to the Students/colleges immediately. Complete fees of
the professional courses be reimbursed without any delay and also
the Remaining Amount of the previous two years be paid to the
students.
If the demands are not given a serious consideration, then the
organization will be forced to take the legal course of action.
After the demonstration, a delegation
of SIO met Joint Director of Higher
Education Shantikumar Gupta and apprised him of the total scenario
and nuisance going on within the education department. Following
which, the Joint Director assured that the matter would be put for
discussion on the meeting scheduled for June 21.
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