Rs 20-crore SC scholarship scam unearthed in Punjab

Charanjit Bhullar

Tribune News Service

Bathinda, September 21

The Punjab Government has unearthed embezzlement of around Rs 20 crore under the post-matric scholarship scheme of the Punjab Welfare Department during 2014-15. Several institutions imparting technical education in the state allegedly made dummy admissions during the session.

Around 1,700 Scheduled Caste students were shown enrolled at two colleges simultaneously. The discrepancy came to light when the names of beneficiaries were linked with their Aadhaar numbers. Out of them, 966 were listed as beneficiaries both under the minority quota and the Welfare Department scheme.

The state government has now started verifying record of various private and government colleges.

To escape action, private colleges allegedly showed 6,000 SC students as drop-outs even as 80 per cent of their scholarship amount (around 10 crore) had already been released.

Twenty-seven students were shown enrolled at three different colleges in the same academic session. Kuldeep Singh was shown enrolled at Guru Nanak Khalsa College, Fazilka, for BA-I; at Abohar Polytechnic College for a technical course; and at Baba Deep Singh Polytechnic college, Muktsar, for a computer course. Narinder Singh was shown doing BA-I from Public College, Samana; a diploma course at Nancy Polytechnic besides pursuing a yet another course at Lovely Professional University.

In all, 1,674 students were shown “admitted” to two colleges simultaneously. Varinder Singh was shown enrolled at Guru Hargobind Polytechnic, Bathinda, besides pursuing another course at Abhishek Polytechnic in Fazilka.

Though private colleges showed them as drop-outs, around 80 per cent of their scholarship amount had already been claimed.

In Bathinda district, 20 students allegedly appeared at two examination centres on the same day and same time.