Punjab Unaided Colleges are in Dilemma as the management is in massive confusion over OBC Scholarship. It has not been yet cleared by Punjab Government whether the fees would be charged from OBC students or Government would release their funds under the Centre's Post Matric Scholarship (PMS) scheme.Recently a delegation of Punjab Unaided Technical Institutions Association (PUTIA) headed by President, PUTIA, Dr J S Dhaliwal met with the Director, Welfare of SC/BC, Punjab, S. Paramjit Singh and demanded the release of OBC scholarship along with SC/ST Scholarship.Vice President, PUTIA and Executive Vice Chairman, Doaba Group of Colleges, S. Manjit Singh said that the private educational institutes of Punjab are awaiting reimbursement of fees on account of students belonging to the OBC category, but the state government has not released funds since last many years.
Convener, PUTIA and Chairman, Aryans Group of Colleges, Dr. Anshu Kataria said that "We cannot deny admission to SC/ST/OBC students. But at the same time we need funds to run our institutions." District administration asks not to charge anything from SC/ST/OBC but Punjab does not release the payment on time due to which institutions are facing financial crisis.Dr.Kataria added that soon a delegation of PUTIA would meet the HRD Minister, Mrs. Smriti Irani and Minister of state for Social Justice and Empowerment, Mr. Vijay Sampla and would update about the SC/ST/OBC scholarship scenario in Punjab and poor state of unaided educational institutions.
S. Manjit Singh further said that because of the delay in the payment of PMS by the state, the financial system of many colleges is upset, while on the other hand, if colleges doesn’t serve the debt taken from the bank for over 90 days the account is declared as Non Performing assets (NPA).Dr.J S Dhaliwal said that many states, including Himachal Pradesh, Bihar etc. reimburse the scholarship to the OBC students. Dr. Dhaliwal questioned when centre govt has a policy to pay the scholarship for the OBC students then why it is not there in Punjab.