Centrally Sponsored Schemes for social justice often suffer from delayed state contributions. Examine this in the context of the revamped Post-Matric Scholarship Scheme for SCs.

Centrally Sponsored Schemes operate on Centre–State cost sharing, so a State's fiscal stress transmits directly to the beneficiary. The Post-Matric Scholarship Scheme for SCs (PMS-SC), restructured by the Cabinet in December 2020, illustrates both the problem and the limits of the cure.

How delayed State contributions crippled delivery

• Under the earlier "committed liability" model, the Centre funded only expenditure above a State's frozen liability, so every expansion in enrolment became a State burden — producing arrears and irregular releases [1].
• CAG audit of the scheme recorded delays of up to five years in payment of scholarships, even after an online disbursal portal was introduced [2].
• Audit also found non-payment of tuition, exam and special fees to institutions and short payment of accommodation charges — costs that shift onto the poorest students [2].

What the revamp attempted

• Committed liability was replaced by a fixed 60:40 Centre–State sharing pattern (90:10 for North-Eastern States), with a total outlay of ₹59,048 crore, of which the Centre bears ₹35,534 crore [1].
• From 2021-22, the Central share is released on DBT mode into Aadhaar-seeded bank accounts of students, bypassing intermediate State treasuries [1][3].
• Targeting is anchored in a ₹2.5 lakh annual family income ceiling, aimed at raising the Gross Enrolment Ratio of SC students in higher education [3][4].

Why the bottleneck persists

• The Central share is released only after confirming that the State has released its share — so a delaying State still gates the entire transfer [1][2].
• A recurring 40 per cent cash outgo is a harder annual budget commitment for fiscally stressed States than the old capped liability.
• Last-mile failures continue: credits fail on wrong account numbers or IFS codes, and audit found no effective mechanism for periodic review at State and regional levels [2].

The revamp has corrected the design flaw but not the fiscal one. Timely single-nodal-account transfers, real-time public dashboards of pending State shares, and audited grievance redressal would complete the reform — making Article 46's promise of promoting the educational interests of Scheduled Castes a matter of assured entitlement rather than administrative goodwill.