Education of Minorities

Central assistance is being provided to State Governments for the appointment of Urdu language teachers on a normative basis in Block/Districts where there is a concentration of educationally backward minorities. The Scheme of Assistance for Infrastructure and Modernisation of Madrasas provides assistance for meeting the salary requirements @ Rs. 3000 (three thousand) each per month for two teachers in each madrasa to impart education in non traditional subjects of Mathematics, Science, English etc. and one time assistance of Rs. 7000 (seven thousand) to each madrasa for subject kits and teaching aids as well as another one time assistance of Rs. 7000(seven thousand) for establishing book banks in each madrasa. Apart from this the infrastructure component of the scheme allows construction of physical facilities such as additional rooms. The entire budgetary provision under the scheme has been fully utilized each year (last year an amount of Rs. 29 crore was disbursed to madrasas through State Governments), because of the demand for infrastructure . Under the scheme, the State Governments have an important role to play forwarding cases of NGOs and Wakf Boards managing madrasas. States have been requested to popularize the scheme by giving it wide publicity and expeditious documentation and processing

One of the commitments under the NCMP is the protection of the Fundamental Rights of Minorities under Article 30(1) of the Constitution. In keeping with the promise made under the NCMP, a National Commission for Minority Educational Institutions (NCMEI) has been established through an act of Parliament. It provides inter alia, for the right of minority educational institutions to seek affiliation to any university of their choice, provided the relevant law under which such universities are created allow such affiliation. It also seeks to overcome problems faced by minorities in seeking no objection certificates for establishing educational institution of their choice. Disputes relating to the minority status of educational institutions are also to be resolved by the commission. Thus, for the first time, Article 30(1) of the Constitution, which gives minorities the right to establish and administer educational institution of their choice, would be effectively implemented through the NCMEI Act.

As many as 244 Special Focus districts have been identified for attention in education. One of the criteria use for the selection of these districts is the concentration of minority population. Polytechnic level institutions in 185 of these special focus districts are beings upgraded during the 10th and 11th Plans, of which 84 districts have a concentration of minority population. New Polytechnics are also being established in 65 districts across the two plan periods, twelve of these have minority concentration.

See links below for the The National Commission for Minority Educational Institution Act, 2004 and its amended version of 2006.