During Kaushalacharya Samadar 2020, PM Narendra Modi emphasized excellence in skilling, up-skilling, and re-skilling for Atmanirbhar Bharat. Rising India is looking for an extraordinary contribution by skilling youth in the age group of 15 to 59 for a future-ready workforce. Due to global skill shortage, India can take mileage by giving funding to the unorganized sectors, such as bringing more and more unskilled youth to the campaign to prepare the youth in an environment of global competition. After the Covid-19 stroke, students are incorporating and learning digital education to prepare, test, and obtain an online education certificate.

There are various schemes that have been introduced by the University Grants Commission for the differently-abled candidates to be upskilled that offers them financial compensations:

Higher Education for Persons with Special Needs (HEPSN)-

The HEPSN scheme is basically meant for creating an environment at the higher education institutions to enrich higher education learning experiences for differently-abled persons. Creating awareness about the capabilities of differently-abled persons, construction aimed at improving accessibility, purchase of equipment to enrich learning, etc., are the broad categories of assistance under this scheme. The Financial assistance that will be offered by the University is in three parts COMP I Rs. 1.18 lakhs p.a, COMP II is Rs. 10 lakhs per plan and COMP III is Rs. 8 lakhs per plan. On the other hand, the Financial assistance by the College would be COMP I Rs. 98000 p.a, COMP II Rs. 5 lakh per plan and COMP III is Rs. 1.50 lakh per plan.

The Teacher Preparation in Special Education (TEPSE)-

The scheme is meant for assisting Departments of Education to launch special education teachers’ preparation programs to prepare special teachers to teach children with disabilities in both special and inclusive settings. The scheme provides financial assistance to offer B.Ed. and M.Ed. Degree courses with specialization in one of the disability areas. The specific objective of the TEPSE schemes is to encourage Universities to start M.Ed. special education courses to prepare teacher- educators to serve in higher education institutions offering special education teacher preparation courses. Financial Assistance in B.Ed/ M.Ed is Rs. 2 lakh (one time) and Staff Salary whereas for B.Ed and M.Ed is Rs. 4 lakh (one time) staff salary.

Financial Assistance to Visually Challenged Teachers by the UGC offers Financial Assistance of Rs. 36000 p.a-The Scheme has been formulated to help visually challenged permanent teachers to pursue teaching and research with the help of a Reader and by using teaching and learning aids by way of providing Reader’s Allowance and funds for the purchase of Braille books, recorded materials, etc. and help such teachers achieve self-dependence by using various aids for teaching, learning and research. Financial assistance under the scheme is available to such universities and colleges which come within the purview of section 2(f) and are fit to receive central assistance under Section 12B of the UGC Act, 1956.

National Fellowship for Persons with Disabilities-

University Grants Commission (UGC) on behalf of the Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities (DEPwD), the Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment invites applications from eligible candidates for National Fellowship for Persons with Disabilities (NFPwD) for the selections years 2018-19 and 2019-2020. Under this scheme, the fellowship will be available to students with disabilities who are covered under ‘The Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act, 1995. Thus a person with a disability, who wishes to avail of the benefits under the Act has to obtain a disability certificate from the medical authority notified for the purpose.

Author of the article- Mr. Prashant Agarwal, President of Narayan Seva Sansthan