Kids of victims of violent attacks to get financial aid

KOCHI: The state cabinet is expected to clear a scheme for providing aid and educational support to children of victims of violent attacks and political clashes. About 1,400 children have been identified in the state who would be offered financial support this year.
"Once the scheme is cleared by the cabinet on May 29, children of the victims of such violent attack will get the same aid and educational support offered to children of jail inmates and to the children of deceased parents under the existing Snehapoorvam scheme," Subair KK, officer at the Social Justice Department said.
Currently, per year, Rs 3,000 and Rs 5,000 are provided to such children belonging to Classes I-V and Classes VI-X, respectively. Children in Plus One and Plus Two get Rs 7,500 while children in degree courses receive Rs 10,000.
"Since last year, children who are keen to go for professional courses such as engineering and medical courses receive a maximum grant-in-aid of Rs 1 lakh. The jail inmates are supposed to submit the application through the respective jail superintendent to the SJD director," said the officer.
Yet only one professional student had applied for the beneficiary grant last year, he added. The reason could be the stringent criterion specified for applicants.
"Now, a proposal has been forwarded to the government to relax the stringent eligibility norms such as they should belong to BPL families, they should have obtained admission through government merit-list and they should have scored 70% or above marks in higher secondary," the official said.
"The existing criteria for eligibility of jail inmates' children for the financial aid specify that only the children of jail inmates who have served a minimum of two years in jail or sentenced to life term or capital punishment will benefit from the scheme. If the name of the child is not mentioned in the ration card of the parent who is a jail inmate, then they should get a letter from a village officer certifying that the child belongs to the jail inmate. In case both the parents are in jail, then an enquiry report from a probationary officer will suffice," said the officer.
"Such mandatory and stringent eligibility criterion will have an impact on the purpose of the scheme and many parents will not be keen to reveal such details as it might affect the self-esteem of their children," the officer added.