Punjab Planning Board vice chairman Prof Rajinder Bhandari today said that the Punjab government is committed for providing quality education to the students. He said for this purpose, several welfare schemes have been started in Punjab with special emphasis on students studying in government schools. Prof Bhandari today distributed bicycles amongst girl students of Shaheed-E-Azam Sukhdev Thapar Government Senior Secondary School, Bharat Nagar, here.While addressing the students, Prof Bhandari said that for promoting education amongst girls, Mai Bhago Vidya Scheme has been specially started by Punjab government under which bicycles are being distributed to girl students, Mai Bhago Armed Forces Preparatory Institute has been started for training girls for joining the armed forces, and Meritorious Schools have been started in different parts of the state where the students scoring above 80% marks are getting free education, coaching, hostel, food and other such amenities.
Prof Bhandari said that all these initiatives have been taken specially by Punjab CM Mr Parkash Singh Badal, who is focussing on promoting education in the state. While listing the achievements of the Punjab government, he said that under the Mai Bhago Vidya Scheme around 4.86 lakh girl students of class 10+1 and 10+2 were provided with the cycles free of cost. Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal has started this scheme to boost the girl students and their parents for education.
Apart from Mai Bhago Scheme, thirty thousand scholarships is being given to the students with eighty percent marks by the government and meritorious schools were opened for the intelligent schools. He also shared his life experiences with the students and urged them to work hard in life if they want to scale greater heights.Prominent among those present on the occasion included School principal Mrs Kamaljit Kaur, lecturers Jhalmal Singh, Preeti Batish, Kuldip Singh, Sweety Badwal, Surinder Kaur, Sukhwinder Singh, besides several others.