THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Left Democratic Front (LDF) government has issued an order instituting 5,000 scholarships and boarding stipends for Muslim girl students pursuing college education.
The LDF decided to offer the scholarships and other welfare schemes, including a pension scheme for the madrasa teachers, based on recommendations by the Sachar Committee appointed by Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh to study the socioeconomic status of India’s largest religious minority. “The students will get the scholarships from this academic year itself. There will also be a stipend of Rs 1000 a month for those who are pursuing their studies staying in the government-approved hostels,” an official statement said here last week.
The Committee submitted its report after studying conditions of Muslims in various states including Kerala. India is home to the largest number of Muslims in the world after Indonesia.
Following this, the state government formed a committee headed by Paloli Mohammed Kutty, the minister for local self-government, to suggest programs to address the problem, which the Cabinet approved recently. Girl students pursuing professional education will be entitled to Rs 5,000 a year as scholarship while those who are undergoing degree-level courses will get Rs 3,000. Postgraduate students will get Rs 4,000.
The state government is reportedly considering a proposal to constitute a permanent mechanism for supervising minority welfare projects. The 11-member Paloli committee that submitted the recommendation is likely to be converted into a permanent high-power panel to monitor its implementation.
There were complaints that the welfare schemes launched by the government are not reaching the marginalized sections.
The government has formed a minority cell at the Secretariat and Rs 100 million allocated for its functioning.
According to the 2001 Census, Muslims account for 24.7 percent of Kerala’s 32 million population (26.8 percen according to a study commissioned by the CPI-M outfit Kerala Shastra Sahitya Parishad in 2006).
