The Maharashtra Cabinet on Wednesday increased the scope of 1% reservation for orphans and rectified the earlier same decision by dividing the category into three sub-categories.
The orphan children will get benefits applicable to the Scheduled Castes category students including concession in age limit and exam fee, scholarship and fee reimbursement. As per the new decision, two of the three categories of orphans will also get reservation in jobs.
Women and Child Welfare Minister Yashomati Thakur said the decision will bring a new ray of hope for the orphan children. “The definition of orphan has been changed as different cases could not be treated with identical rules,” said Ms. Thakur.
Three categories
The definition includes three categories — A, B and C. A category includes orphans about whom no information of parents, siblings, close relatives, village, address are available. B category would have children who lost parents and have not been able to acquire caste certificate and the child has grown in an orphan care organisation. C category includes kids whose parents are dead but close relatives are alive with whom the kid has grown up as a result information about the caste is available.
The A and B category kids will get reservation benefits in jobs, education, scholarship and fee reimbursement. The C category will not get reservation benefits in jobs.
