The finance ministry is expected to announce a new scheme, focused on education of scheduled castes, in the coming Budget. The ministry is expected to provide Rs 325 crore (Rs 3.25 billion) for setting up 2,000 Navodaya Vidyalayas (schools).
The idea is to significantly enhance the educational facilities that are available to scheduled caste students, official sources said. The ministry is also expected to accept the recommendations of a committee, headed by former Karnataka chief minister Veerappa Moily, and announce a higher education scholarship of Rs 120 crore (Rs 1.20 billion) for other backward classes.
For 2006-07, Finance Minister P Chidambaram had enhanced allocations for schemes, benefiting only SC/STs, by 14.5 per cent to Rs 2,902 crore (Rs 29.02 billion).
The allocation for schemes, which have at least 20 per cent reservation for SC/STs, was also raised by 13.9 per cent to Rs 9,690 crore (Rs 96.90 billion).
The ministry is also expected to consider a proposal of the rural development ministry and raise the allocations for the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme to Rs 12,000 crore (Rs 120 billion) in 2007-08, compared to Rs 11,300 crore (Rs 113 billion) for the current fiscal. The scheme will also be extended to 330 districts from the current 200 districts.
The allocation for the flagship Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan of the UPA government, may be set at Rs 10,671 crore (Rs 106.71 billion). However, only Rs 8,800 crore (Rs 88 billion) will be the budgetary allocation, while the remaining amount is expected to come from cess collections.
