As many as 149 eligible students from Maharashtra have reportedly been excluded from the Centre’s National Overseas Scholarship Scheme (NOSS) due to the newly implemented 10% state cap, which was enforced in the current year.
As per the new guidelines, there is a cap of 10% of the total slots for each state while allotting the slots. In case, the slots of any state remains vacant, then these slots for that year will be open for allocation to the candidates belonging to other states including the state on which the cap of 10% has been applied.
The National Overseas Scholarship (NOS) Scheme, which is a flagship of the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, aims to provide financial assistance to candidates for pursuing master’s programmes or PhD courses in any field of study at accredited institutions/universities abroad.
As per the list of selected candidates for NOSS released earlier this month on July 19 by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, 125 candidates were awarded the scholarship from 19 different states across India.
However, as highlighted by a non-governmental organisation (NGO) The Platform, a large number of eligible candidates from Maharashtra missed out on the opportunity due to the high number of applicants from Maharashtra, compared to the relatively low numbers from other states.
Speaking to EdexLive, Rajiv Khobragade, a member of The Platform, explained, “In all other states, except Maharashtra and Gujarat, all eligible students who applied for the scholarship were selected. In Gujarat, six of the students were not selected, while in Maharashtra, as many as 149 were left out. These are the students who are getting admission to top-notch universities. They are not rejected due to merit, they are rejected because there is no seat available”
Khobragade added that this data points towards a larger scarcity of scholarships available for Maharashtra students — both centrally and state-funded.
“Each state has their own scholarships for overseas education. In fact, states like Karnataka provide scholarships to 500 students each year. However, in Maharashtra, only 75 students are selected for the state’s Rajarshi Shahu Maharaj Scholarship each year. This is a huge gap for a state where so many students aspire to go abroad every year. That is the reason so many avail the NOSS,” Khobargade added.
The organisation has now sent an appeal to the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, emphasising the urgent need to revise the selection criteria and increase the number of scholarship slots.
Equality or Equity?
Several students who were not selected from Maharashtra were left disheartened this year, as they were left out of the scholarship aid despite having secured admissions in high-ranked foreign universities.
One such candidate, Sumit Jhambulkar, who has an offer letter from the University of Bristol (QS World Ranking 55), expressed, “This scheme aims at empowering students from the Scheduled Caste (SC) category. For the SC community, getting admission into a high-ranked university with a world rank of 55 is a huge achievement. But the state cap is creating obstacles for students in our community. There is a difference between equality and equity. They are not providing seats where it is needed the most.”
It may be noted that the NOSS aims to facilitate overseas education for students belonging to Scheduled Castes (SC), Denotified Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Tribes (DNT/SNT), Landless Agricultural Labourers (LAL), and Traditional Artisans (TA) categories.
Jhambulkar highlighted that candidates are often forced to defer their admissions into foreign universities by one year due to delays in the release of the list of selected candidates by the Centre every year.
Urvashi, parent of another such candidate from Maharashtra, shared, “Last year, my daughter had an offer letter from a top-ranked university. However, the deadline for NOSS was the end of March 2023. As we began our application only a week before the deadline and there were several glitches on the official portal, we had to defer the admission by one year. This year, the application portal opened on February 15, and we decided to start early. At that time, there were no new guidelines regarding the state quota on the website.”
“It is discrimination because she could not bag a slot only because she is from Maharashtra. Students with offers from universities with rank 480 are getting scholarships. But students who have offers from universities under the top 50 cannot get financial aid,” she said.
The parent informed that she might take a legal route against the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment regarding the issue.
“Due to the current situation, we will have to start applying to universities again and repeat all the processes. My daughter’s IELTS score will also expire this year. We have wasted so much time and money already,” said the parent.
