Odishatv Bureau
New Delhi: The Minority Affairs Ministry today got an outlay of Rs 3,135 crore in the General Budget 2012-13, an increase of Rs 385 crore over the revised estimates for the current financial year. Last year, the Ministry was allocated a total annual budget of Rs 2,750 crore. The Budget 2012-13 increases significantly the outlay for scholarship schemes being implemented by the Ministry for the students belonging to the Minority community.

Under the increased total outlay, the provision for Pre-Matric Scholarship scheme run by the Ministry has been increased from Rs 540 crore to Rs 810 crore and the allocation for Post-Matric Scholarship scheme has been hiked to Rs 450 crore from the last year`s Rs 405 crore. For the Merit-cum-means Scholarship scheme, the Ministry will get Rs 198 crore as against Rs 126 crore sanctioned during the Revised Budget Estimates for the last financial year.

For the Maulana Azad National Fellowship for Minority students, the budgetary allocation has been increased from Rs 47 crore to Rs 63 crore. The Budget also provides Rs 4.50 crore for a new scheme to provide free cycles to girl students of class IX with the objective of retention of minority girl students in high schools.

For providing gainful employment to unskilled youth from the minority community, the budget provides Rs 18 crore which will take care of their skill development and inclusive growth. The Ministry also got Rs 19.70 crore as Non-Plan provision so that the total finances available with it for the next financial year is Rs 3,154.70 crore.

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