In order to help students fulfill their dreams of pursuing higher education, West Bengal government officials, in the presence of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, distributed a “student credit card”. The collateral-free loan scheme was launched last year in July as part of the pre-survey pledge, which can be used by students who have passed the class 10 exam.
Students are eligible to avail up to Rs 10 lakh at nominal annual interest rate under this scheme. For students from an economically disadvantaged background, this initiative will help them achieve their dreams. While outlining the objective of the program, a government official said, “The education sector in Bengal has made leaps and bounds. Accessibility, affordability and quality of education have been our top priorities. Our journey of progress will continue unhindered.
Regime losing appeal?
The West Bengal Student Credit Card Scheme (WBSCC) seems to be losing its appeal with students and parents as many showed reluctance to attend the July 7 event at the Netaji Indoor Stadium, Kolkata. Last year in July, the state education department received more than 1 lakh of applications, but the bank authorized about 18,000 applications for loan disbursement.
A senior state official said, “After the scheme was launched following assembly elections last year, around 1.25 lakh loan applications were received and were sanctioned.”
According to the education department, around 18,000 students were expected to attend the event on Thursday. While, till Wednesday, the joint government committee of Bengal received only 6,000 responses for attendance, which is a third of the targeted students. This means that the student’s responses were low for some reason. For example, when contacting, some recipients said that they applied for the charge last year, and now they don’t need the money because they already arranged it somewhere, a reported The Telegraph.
Bengal has been the land that has nurtured great minds over generations.
GoWB under the able guidance of CM @MamataOfficial ensured affordable, accessible and quality education for all.
We want young people in Bengal to have access to all the opportunities they seek! pic.twitter.com/td1dIm4iXC
— Trinamool Indian Congress (@AITCofficial) July 7, 2022
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