Students belonging to the earthquake-hit areas of Jammu and Kashmir can pay their fees at a subsidised rate in all professional courses in Maharashtra in the coming academic session.
The seats would become available to the students of quake-affected areas of Jammu and Kashmir on the pattern of Kashmiri migrants, children of military and paramilitary forces, state police and border areas affected by shelling, Uttar Pradesh President of Nationalist Congress Party, Thakur Randhir Singh said in Jammu on Monday.
Singh, who took up the matter with the NCP President and Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar and Minister for Technical Education in Maharashtra Government, Dalip Walse Patil, was assured of such commitment by them. The Pradesh NCP chief said his party would make available forms and other information to the quake affected students nearer to their homes once the Maharashtra government announces the admission process for the next academic session.
More than 900 seats are provided in 150 engineering colleges of Maharashtra for the students of Jammu and Kashmir, he said adding they have to pay the fee in all private colleges at the rate at which it is paid in the government institutions. The fee per year in private colleges comes to only Rs 12,000 whereas the students of general category have to pay Rs 70,000 annually.
The provision of special reservation for Kashmiri migrants in Maharashtra colleges was made in 1991 and later extended to the children of military and paramilitary forces, police and students from border areas who were affected by continuous Pakistani shelling or firing.