MAINSTREAMING THE MINORITIES

M L Dhar*

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The minorities are an inseparable part of Indian society. They live amidst their majority brethren and share their mutual joys and sorrows. The minorities have contributed significantly to the development of Indian society and culture. They have become an integral part of the Indian society.

The minorities, namely, Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists and Parsis constitute about 18 per cent of the country’s population according to the 1991 census. Among them Muslims are the largest community constituting an important web in the social fabric of India. Despite their glorious past and outstanding contributions to the Indian society and culture, they were left behind for historical reasons. At the end of the colonial rule they found themselves educationally backward and economically degraded.

The founding fathers of the Indian Constitution envisaged equality of opportunities for all citizens irrespective of creed, caste or gender. Articles 14 and 15 were incorporated to ensure equality and prohibit the State from discriminating against any citizen on the basis of religion. Not only that, the founding fathers also incorporated Article 30 to give the minorities the right to establish and administer their own educational institutions.

Importance

Given their numbers, the minorities constitute an important human resource. It has been the endeavour of the State since Independence to ensure their empowerment through education and promote their economic development. The recent years have witnessed a tremendous upsurge in these activities. Lauding these efforts, the Prime Minister Shri, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, at a recent National Convention on Minorities, urged the minorities in general and the Muslims in particular to go in for modern education. He said, "Education is an investment for development, for progress and for a better future."

Way back in the latter half of the 19th century Sir Saiyyed Ahmed Khan wanted the Muslims to shun off their educational backwardness and deprivation by going in for modern education. He set up institutions of learning and suggested modern education as a panacea for the ills affecting the Muslims. Yet his efforts touched the problem only on its fringes with a majority of them, particularly among the proper sections, remaining deprived of modern education.

Empowerment

The Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment being the nodal Ministry to ensure social justice to the weaker sections of society, has taken several initiatives to meet the challenge. It has involved non-governmental organisations (NGOs) for broader participation of the target groups. The Ministry has set up the Maulana Azad Education Foundation, a non-profit social service organisation with the objective of promoting education among the backward sections of the minorities, particularly the Muslims. It is fully funded by the Ministry.

Maulana Azad Education Foundation

The Maulana Azad Education Foundation provides financial assistance for setting up new schools and expansion of the existing ones. These include residential schools and construction of hostels for girls belonging to the educationally backward minorities. The main focus of its schemes is to promote education among girls from among the minority communities. In order to meet the requirements of modern economy, the Foundation lays greater stress on promoting vocational and technical training among the target groups. It has been providing financial assistance for strengthening vocational and technical training centres. Under yet another scheme, the Foundation assists NGOs in providing coaching to the students belonging to the educationally backward minority communities to enable them compete on equal terms with other candidates in competitive examinations for jobs and admission to institutions of professional, technical and higher learning.

The Foundation has so far assisted over 424 NGOs in 21 States and Union Territories by providing them grants-in-aid amounting to Rs. 59.19 crore. The Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment has earmarked Rs. 30 crore for the Foundation during the 10th Plan to raise its corpus to Rs. 100 crore. The Foundation finances its activities from the interest accured on its corpus fund.

Central Wakf Council

The Central Wakf Council, constituted to protect Wakf properties, also contributes in its own way to promote education among the Muslims. It has set up an Education Fund with donation not exceeding 6 per cent on the loans advanced by it to the loanee Wakf institutions for maintenance and development of Wakf properties. The interest accrued on the bank deposits of the Revolving Fund of the Council is also credited to the Education Fund. Out of it the Council provides grants for educational purposes such as scholarship to the students, promotion of technical education and for setting up book banks. The Council’s expenditure on educational activities doubled from Rs.53.6 lakh in 1997-98 to Rs. 1.19 crore in 2001-02.

The Council provides scholarships to poor students at the rate of Rs.6000 per annum for pursuing technical or professional education and Rs.3, 000 per annum as ad-hoc grant to poor and needy students for general degree courses. It also provides matching grant to State Wakf Boards for giving scholarships to students studying in schools, madrasas and those undertaking technical and professional diploma courses. The Council has released 8,076 scholarships to the students of technical degree courses like MBBS, BUMS, B.Tech., B.Sc. and agriculture so far. Similarly, more than 1500 poor and needy students have been provided ad-hoc grants. As many as 596 voluntary organisations have been assisted for imparting technical and voluntary training.

Industrial Training Institutes

The Central Wakf Council, under a newly-launched scheme, also provides grant for establishing Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs ) in areas where the Muslims are concentrated. Nine industrial training institutes have been sanctioned. Five of them are in Uttar Pradesh, three in Bihar and one in Orissa. One of them in Azamgarh in Uttar Pradesh is exclusively meant for training girls. Each ITI is provided assistance of 15 to 20 lakh rupees per annum for the first three years as cent per cent grant. Subsequently, the grant is reduced to 50 per cent in the 4th year and to 25 per cent in the 5th year. Each ITI is required to give vocational training in three area-specific trades in addition to various other vocational jobs.

Pre-Examination Coaching

Pre-examination coaching is one of the important tools of mainstreaming the minorities and weaker sections of the society. The scheme is based on economic criteria among the minorities to enable them to compete on equal terms with other candidates in competitive examinations for various services and admission to professional and technical institutions. The entrance examination to services include those in Central and State governments, public sector undertakings, banks and the private sector. The centre shares 90 per cent of the expenditure for running coaching programmes by universities and NGOs. Institutions run by the State governments are assisted on a 50:50 basis. However, cent per cent assistance is provided in case of the Union Territories. Over 45,700 students have been benefited under this scheme of financial assistance through 567 training institutes till the end of 2002.

In addition, the Ministry of Human Resource Development is running educational development programmes in minority-concentrated areas. Altogether 325 blocks in 13 States and 3 Union Territories and 4 districts in Assam are being provided with basic educational infrastructural facilities under the Area-Intensive Programme for Educationally Backward Minorities. The Ministry is also running a scheme for modernization of the madrasas. They are given financial assistance for teaching of science, mathematics and social studies.

Economic Empowerment

The welfare of minorities would be incomplete in the absence of economic empowerment. The National Minorities Finance and Development Corporation (NMDFC) was set up in 1994 to promote the economic development of the notified minorities. The corporation assists with loans for self-employment and other ventures for the benefit of the minorities. It gives preference to occupational groups and women.

The Corporation has three major loan schemes. Under the Terms Loan Scheme, loans are provided for projects costing upto five lakh rupees. Such assistance is available for commercially viable ventures in agriculture and allied sectors, technical trades, small businesses, artisan and traditional occupations and transport and service sectors. The other scheme known as Margin Money Loan Scheme meets the requirement of margin money asked by bankers to the beneficiaries availing bank finance. For this purpose, loans upto 25 per cent of the project cost subject to a maximum of Rs. 1.25 lakh per unit is made available. The NMDFC had given financial assistance through the State Channelsing Agencies to over 1.19 lakh beneficiaries with a cumulative disbursement of Rs. 435.53 crore till the end of December, 2002.

However, the major problem is of the poorest of the poor who need very small loans with quick delivery at their doorsteps. Approximately 80 per cent population among the target groups is constantly in need of small loans for sustaining their existing employment or for generating further employment besides meeting varied personal and social needs. Traditionally, this requirement has been met by money lenders who, instead of helping the borrower, have worsened his plight.

Micro Financing

In course of time it has been realised that provision of credit is an instrument of socio-economic change and development. This can be met with the provision of soft loans that also liberalizes the poor from the clutches of moneylenders. The Corporation has come up with schemes of micro financing to meet the credit needs of the poor. The maximum amount available under micro finance is Rs. 10,000 and the size of average loan is Rs.5,000. It has recently launched the Mahila Samridhi Yojana for empowering the poor minority women. It envisages training of the beneficiary before provision of micro credit.

About 50,000 beneficiaries were assisted with nearly Rs. 8.40 crore under micro-financing till 2002. This includes micro credit of Rs.7.80 crore to over 20,000 beneficiaries and interest-free loans of Rs. 64 lakh to the NGOs for organizing Self-Help Groups covering over 30,000 beneficiaries.

These initiatives aimed at educational and economic development of the minorities are proving crucial in meeting the ends of social justice and in their mainstreaming. Our national goal is to have socially and educationally empowered and economically prosperous minorities as national assets.(PIB Features)

*Information Officer, PIB, New Delhi.