SRINAGAR: Jammu and Kashmir has no Minority Commission though Muslims, Sikhs, Christian, Buddhist and Jain have been declared National Minorities. There is no plan to grant Sikhs minority status since they have been declared as National Minority.
The information was given by Minister for Social Welfare Sajjad Gani Lone in reply to a clubbed question of Vibodh Gupta, S Dharambir and S Charanjeet Singh in the Legislative Council today.
He said there was no Minority Commission in the state and there was no intention to set up the commission. He said no community has been declared as minority by the state government.
However, 68.31 per cent Muslims have been declared national minorities in the state followed by 1.87 per cent Sikhs, 0.90 per cent Buddhists, 0.28 Christians and 0.02 per cent Jains. The reply said the scholarship is provided to the meritorious students belonging to economically weaker sections of the Minority Communities.
Scholarship is awarded to the students who have secured not less than 50 per cent marks or equivalent in the previous final examination. However, the annual income of the parents or guardian of the students from all sources will not exceed Rs one lakh in respect of Pre-Matric, Rs two lakh for post matric and Rs 2.50 lakh for Merit-cum means scholarship scheme.
There are various schemes of central government for uplift of minorities in Jammu and Kashmir which included Multisectoral development programme, presently under implementation in Leh district and block Nowshera in Rajouri district, Post matric scholarship to students, merit cum means based scholarship to the students, pre matric scholarship, schemes of National Minority Development and Finance Corporation (NMDFC) through women development corporation, schemes and finance corporation of NMDFC through SC, ST,BC development corporation.
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