Bharati Scheme for Master’s Degree Overseas(BSMDO)

Overview

About BSMDO

The size of this award turns on one number that has nothing to do with merit, fees or the university's standing: how many months the course abroad actually runs. The Andhra Pradesh Brahmin Welfare Corporation releases Rs 5,00,000 where the course lasts more than 11 months and less than 18, and Rs 10,00,000 where the master's programme runs 18 months or longer (BS-MDO guidelines PDF, archived copy). A course that ends just short of that 18-month line and one that clears it are two different grants.

It is one-time assistance, paid into the applicant's own savings account after selection, not a fee waiver and not a yearly stipend. The corporation runs it for Brahmin students whose parents live in Andhra Pradesh, and the notification covers all 13 districts as the state stood when it was written (archived BS-MDO guidelines).

No BS-MDO award count appears in the documents the corporation publishes for download. The nearest thing to one is the overseas line that ran before it, a row headed Bharati Overseas in the abstract of beneficiaries covering 2015-16 to 2018-19 (Abstract of beneficiaries, archived copy). All four of those years close before the notification that introduced BS-MDO for 2019-20 (archived BS-MDO guidelines), so those are the predecessor's numbers and not this scheme's.

Who runs it

Provider

At a glance

Key details

Calendar

Important dates

The notification names the year it was written for, 2019-20, and then gives no opening date, no closing date and no month (archived BS-MDO guidelines). Windows are announced instead on the corporation's Notifications page, and no BS-MDO notice appears on it at any date. Its one overseas posting, dated 22-09-2015, invites applications from Brahmin students who had secured admission that year to a postgraduate course overseas in reputed institutions, and prints no last date under it at all (APBWC notifications, archived copy), so a reader cannot assume an announced round will come with a published closing date. What the notification does fix is how late a file can be assembled: proof of admission with fees paid, and the passport, visa and air ticket, are all required at upload (archived BS-MDO guidelines), so nothing can be sent in until the travel papers exist, whatever window the corporation eventually announces.

Who can apply

Eligibility criteria

Nothing here turns on how well the student did. The guidelines set no percentage floor, no GRE or IELTS score, no age limit and no list of approved countries or universities. What they test is the family: the student and both parents must belong to the Brahmin community, the parents must reside in Andhra Pradesh, and annual income of the parents or guardian must not exceed Rs 6,00,000 (archived BS-MDO guidelines). The one quality test the notification does write is that the institution abroad be a reputed one, a word it never defines and never pins to a ranking or a list, so nothing published tells an applicant in advance which admission letters scrutiny will accept.

The course itself has to clear a 12-month floor, and there is a second route in for students who did the first part of a programme in India. The guidelines admit a student in the final year of the PEC course overseas, taken in collaboration with an Indian university or institute, without ever expanding that abbreviation. It is not consistent with itself on that route either: the scope paragraph describes the collaboration as being with a foreign university, while the eligibility clause names an Indian one (archived BS-MDO guidelines). If you are applying on it, get the collaboration letter between the two institutions worded so a scrutiny clerk can match it to the clause.

Who cannot apply

Exclusions

The corporation publishes no separate exclusion list. Two eligibility clauses do that work instead: a student who has already drawn a benefit from the corporation is out, and so is a student who has taken any amount from another government scheme for the same purpose (archived BS-MDO guidelines). The second clause is worth reading before you accept anything else, because a state or central award taken for the same overseas degree closes this door rather than stacking on top of it.

Continuation

Renewal conditions

There is nothing to renew. The assistance is released once, and the bar on a student who has already availed a benefit means the same applicant cannot return in a later year for the other slab (archived BS-MDO guidelines). Taking the lower slab on a shorter course spends the entitlement.

What you get

Award & benefits

Both slabs are flat amounts, and neither is tied to what the university actually charges.

Read the two lists together and a gap appears. Eligibility asks for a course of at least 12 months, while the lower slab is written for anything above 11 months, so in practice the Rs 5,00,000 band opens at 12 months, not 11. A one-year programme that finishes inside 12 months qualifies for neither.

What the corporation has published on the overseas side is four years of that predecessor line:

That is a record of what the corporation could absorb on an overseas budget before the two slabs above existed, not a forecast of what BS-MDO releases, and the abstract itself stops at the financial year before the notification was written.

• Any course being pursued abroad with a duration of 11 to 18 months: ₹5,00,000/-.
• Master’s Degree Programme being pursued abroad with a minimum of 18 months duration: ₹10,00,000/-.

What to prepare

Documents required

The paperwork itself is ordinary. The upload rules are not. Every scanned document goes up as a PDF of no more than 250 kb, the photograph as a JPEG of no more than 50 kb, and two pairs have to be merged rather than uploaded separately: the caste certificate and the MeeSeva income certificate in one PDF, and the passport, visa, air ticket and Form i20 in another (archived BS-MDO guidelines). Scan at a lower DPI before you start rather than after a rejection.

One clause has been overtaken by events. The guidelines require a savings account passbook from Andhra Bank or State Bank of India, in the applicant's own name, but all Andhra Bank branches began functioning as Union Bank of India branches on 1 April 2020 under a scheme notified in the Gazette of India (Reserve Bank of India press release, 28 March 2020). An applicant today cannot open the account the notification names, so ask the corporation which successor account it will accept before you commit to one.

Step by step

How to apply

Applications are filed online on the corporation's own portal at www.andhrabrahmin.ap.gov.in, in its prescribed format, with the scanned documents attached (archived BS-MDO guidelines). The corporation is the only counter the notification names: no college office, no bank branch and no national gateway is offered as an alternative filing route. One warning before you go looking for the form: the corporation's site is currently served under an expired security certificate, so a browser will stop you with a warning on the way in, and the Internet Archive is at present a steadier route to the corporation's notification and its forms than the live site is.

Two different things can be checked after a file goes in, and they answer different questions. Know your status will not take a name: it wants the handle the file was submitted under, plus the year and a date of birth (Know your status, archived copy). A reference number, a mobile number or an Aadhaar number will each do as that handle. The year is a dropdown that starts at 2015-16 (Know your status, archived copy), and the corporation heads that field Financial Year here and Academic / Financial Year on its lists page, so a file can read as missing when only the wrong one was picked. Separately, the corporation publishes whole lists, each narrowed by year, scheme, district and mandal, under four headings of its own: Pending for Scrutiny, Pending for Uploads, List of Rejected applicants and List of Beneficiaries (List of beneficiaries, archived copy). Pending for Scrutiny and Pending for Uploads are two different states, not two names for one queue, so it matters which of them your name is sitting on.

How winners are picked

Selection process

The guidelines describe eligibility and an application procedure and stop. No marks weighting, no interview, no state-level screening committee and no cap on the number of awards is set out in the notification, which means the eligibility test and the scrutiny of uploaded documents are the whole of the published filter. What the notification withholds, the portal supplies after the fact: a rejected list and a beneficiary list are published for each year and scheme, so how a cycle was disposed of is visible even though the rule that produced it is not (List of beneficiaries, archived copy).

Fine print

Terms & conditions

Selection buys one transfer. The amount goes online into the selected applicant's savings account, which has to be in the applicant's own name rather than a parent's, and the release is described as one-time financial assistance (archived BS-MDO guidelines). Nothing in the notification obliges a recipient to return to Andhra Pradesh, to serve a bond, or to submit progress reports, and nothing in it promises a top-up if the rupee moves or the course runs long.

Get help

Contact

Two things are worth settling by phone before a single document is scanned: which bank account the corporation will now accept, and whether any window is open. Queries go to 0866-6650345 and the office switchboard to 0866-6650300, with apbrahmin@gmail.com as the email on record. Its own address for post is the Endowments Commissionerate Campus at Gollapudi, Vijayawada 521 225, Krishna District (APBWC contact page, archived copy). One contact block covers every scheme the corporation runs, so there is no overseas desk to ask for and no BS-MDO helpline.

Source

Official links

Frequently asked questions

From the official scheme FAQ (myScheme)

Read this

Disclaimer

Disclaimer

Scheme details are compiled from myScheme, the Government of India’s official scheme-discovery platform, and are reproduced without alteration. Amounts, deadlines and eligibility change between cycles, so always confirm on the official links above before applying. Expertie does not process applications or charge fees.

Explore more

Related scholarships

References

Sources