3 Pre-matric Scholarships Offered by Karnataka Government

Education is the primary building block of the society and to ensure its proper upliftment, certain educational schemes are required to be implemented. For the development of the educational scenario of the the state of Karnataka, various schemes and developmental programmes are being implemented by the government. Providing scholarships is one of the important schemes that the Karnataka Government has implemented to increase the overall literacy rate of the state. As an initiative of the government, various pre-matric scholarships, basically for the students studying in Class I to X under KSEEB, are being offered by the govt. which has, over the years, contributed hugely towards the upliftment of educational scenario of the state of Karnataka. 3 of the main pre-matric scholarships offered by the govt. under KSEEB are discussed below:

1. Incentive Scholarships:

Introduced in 1992-93 in the commemoration of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar Centenary Celebrations, this scheme is for the encouragement of children studying in standard I - IV and also to minimize the rate of dropouts of basically SC students in the primary level. Under the Incentive Scholarships, each eligible child is given an annual incentive of Rs. 75/- and all SC students who are studying under Karnataka Board of Secondary Education in government recognised or government aided schools are eligible for this scholarship. The document required for applying for the Incentive Scholarship is the caste certificate of the concerned student.

2. Merit Scholarships:

In addition to Incentive Scholarships, SC students studying under KSEEB are also encouraged to continue their studies and score better with Merit Scholarships. The eligibility for Merit Scholarships is that the student must belong from Scheduled Caste community and that they must have scored at least 60% marks in the annual examination of their previous class. The annual income of the parents are not taken into consideration while distributing the Merit Scholarship. Under the Merit Scholarship, the students belonging from the Middle School group, i.e. from Class V to Class VII, are given Rs. 75/- annually and students belonging from Secondary/ High School group, i.e. from Class VIII and Class X, are given Rs. 100/- annually. Caste Certificate of SC students studying under Karnataka Board of Secondary Education along with an application form forwarded by the school authorities are the only documents required for the eligibility of Merit Scholarships. The Merit Scholarship for the previous year is sanctioned after the commencement of the new academic year.

3. Pre-Matric Scholarships to Childrens of Those Parents who are engaged in Unclean Occupations:

A lot of people are engaged in unclean occupations such as cleaning, tanning, etc. amongst whom the literacy rate is very low. To increase the literacy rate amongst these groups, the Pre-Matric Scholarships to Childrens studying under KSEEB are being offered by the Karnataka Govt. As a centrally sponsored scheme, 50 % of the grants come from Central Govt. and 50 % from State Govt. Under this scheme, students studying under Karnataka SSLC Board from Class I to V are given monthly scholarships of Rs. 40/- per month for 10 months, from Class VI to VIII are given scholarships of Rs. 60/- per month for 10 months and Class IX and X students are given Rs. 75/- per month for 10 months. Hostellers from Class III to X are given Rs. 300 per month for 10 months per student. Along with these Pre-Matric scholarships, various other scholarships for students belonging from High Schools and Colleges under KSEEB are also offered by Karnataka Govt. such as Incentive Scholarships for High Schools Going Girls, State Post Matric Scholarship Scheme, Financial Assistance to M. Phil and PhD students, etc. With the scholarships, the overall literacy rate among the students belonging from backward class studying under KSEEB has increased by leaps and bounds over the years and hopefully it will keep doing so in the future.