SRINAGAR: As many as 4,548 Scheduled Tribe students in Jammu and Kashmir received post-matric scholarships for the 2025-26 academic year, with an additional 1,322 students benefiting from the pre-matric scholarship scheme, the Government of India informed the Lok Sabha on Thursday.
Information was available with The Chenab Times that Union Minister of State for Tribal Affairs, Durgadas Uikey, stated that these scholarships are being disbursed through the Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) Tribal Portal. This digital platform is designed for the comprehensive monitoring of the two scholarship schemes, generating essential management information reports, and facilitating the online submission of utilization certificates and expenditure statements by various States and Union Territories.
Scholarship Beneficiaries and Trends
The minister’s statement was in response to a question posed by Members of Parliament, including PP Chaudhary, K. Sudhakar, Jugal Kishore, Mahima Kumari Mewar, Himadri Singh, Nalin Soren, and Manish Jaiswal. Data presented to the Lok Sabha revealed a fluctuating trend in scholarship beneficiaries within Jammu and Kashmir. For the pre-matric scholarship, the number of ST students receiving benefits stood at 4,665 in the 2023-24 academic year. This figure saw a significant decrease to 365 in 2024-25, before rising to 1,322 in 2025-26. Similarly, under the post-matric scholarship scheme, the number of beneficiaries declined from 10,399 in 2023-24 to 6,591 in 2024-25, reaching 4,548 in the 2025-26 period.
Ladakh Beneficiary Data
The data also included figures for Ladakh, which is also covered by the Ministry of Tribal Affairs. In the 2025-26 academic year, Ladakh recorded 2,459 pre-matric scholarship beneficiaries. This represents an increase from 250 beneficiaries in 2024-25 and 82 in 2023-24. For the post-matric scholarship scheme in Ladakh, 139 students received benefits in 2025-26, a notable decrease from the 10,017 beneficiaries in 2024-25 and 2,196 in 2023-24.
Digital Transformation of Scholarship Disbursement
Minister Uikey further elaborated on the Ministry of Tribal Affairs’ commitment to streamlining the scholarship disbursement process through end-to-end digitization. The ministry has implemented common data standards, online processing, and real-time monitoring mechanisms for these scholarship programs. Additionally, the SNA-SPARSH (System for National Scholarship Application and Registration) framework has been introduced to ensure the transparent and timely release of funds directly into the bank accounts of beneficiaries via DBT.
These measures, according to the minister, are strategically designed to minimize processing delays, reduce the number of grievances, eliminate duplication of applications, and curtail the involvement of intermediaries in the entire scholarship disbursement cycle. The focus is on creating a more efficient and equitable system for students from tribal communities seeking educational support.
The Chenab Times News Desk