Pune: Maharashtra Government Revamps Committee For Selecting Schools For Scheduled Tribe Students, Ensuring Focused Support For English Medium Education

Pune, 16th April 2025: In a bid to address the educational challenges faced by Scheduled Tribe students in higher education, the Maharashtra government has decided to prioritize sending these students to renowned English medium residential schools in urban areas. This decision comes in light of the increased use of English in higher education, which has posed difficulties for these students in adapting to the changing academic environment.

To facilitate the selection of English medium residential schools and to determine the school fees, the Tribal Development Department has formed a new committee under the chairmanship of the Principal Secretary of the department. The committee also includes representatives from the Finance Department and the School Education Department.

However, due to the inability of the Principal Secretaries of the Finance and School Education departments to attend the committee meetings, their representatives had been attending in their place. This issue was raised by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) in its report. Taking this into consideration, the government has approved changes to the structure of the committee.

The revamped committee now includes the Additional Chief Secretary or Principal Secretary or Secretary from the Tribal Development Department, along with representatives from the Finance and School Education departments, ensuring more direct involvement in the decision-making process. These changes were formally communicated by Tribal Development Department’s Chief Officer, Sarjerao Patil.