Manoj Tripathi, a student from Jamshedpur, was elated when the Jharkhand government launched the ambitious Guruji Student Credit Card scheme in March this year.

       But his joy was short-lived. After going through the clauses of the scheme, Manoj realised it was a mere dream for him.

       The then Chief Minister, Champai Soren had launched the ‘Guruji Student Credit Card Scheme’ on March 3, 2024.

       Named after Jharkhand’s ruling party JMM’s founder Shibu Soren, who is fondly called Guruji, the scheme has been specially designed for students of the economically weaker sections of society for pursuing higher education by availing loan.

       Under the scheme, a loan of up to Rs 15 lakh will be given at an interest rate of only 4 per cent with a condition to repay in 15 years.

       Loan up to Rs 4 lakh will be granted without any interest. The government has created a corpus of Rs 200 crore for the 'Guruji Student Credit Card Scheme'. Manoj was not the only one debarred. There were thousands of others also.

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       Many students were not bona fide citizens of Jharkhand (an important clause for eligibility) while others were not from institutions that the government has listed for the scheme.

       Manoj’s father works at a private firm and had recently come to Jharkhand from Kolkata.

       According to the clause, the best students from educational institutions in the state or located in other states would be selected.

       The central universities were also surprisingly dropped. Those pursuing professional education like hotel management and fashion designing were left out from the list.

       “The scheme is a dream project of Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren but unfortunately, it did not take off as he envisaged,” a senior faculty in Ranchi University said. Literally, Hemant had worked hard for drafting the scheme and wanted to launch it with much fanfare. But unfortunately, when the time came, he was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate on January 31, 2024 in connection with an alleged land scam.

       In his absence, Champai launched it. By the time Hemant was released from jail on June 28, 2024, the scheme had already created a negative image.

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