Pre-Matric Scholarship for OBC, EBC and DNT Students - DNH & DD(PREMSOBC&EBC)

Overview

About PREMSOBC&EBC

A Class IX student in a government school in Silvassa, Daman or Diu, from an OBC, EBC or DNT household, is looking at one flat academic allowance for the year and at a closing date the territory's Social Welfare Department has already put in writing. The rate, the income ceiling and the two classes it covers are settled nationally. Everything a family has to act on, the notice, the certificates and the school's sign-off, is run out of Moti Daman.

Who pays for this here was settled by a statute rather than by a scheme circular. The Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu (Merger of Union Territories) Act, 2019 received the President's assent on 9th December, 2019, formed one territory out of the two older ones, substituted a single combined entry for them in article 240 of the Constitution, and left the new territory with two seats in the House of the People, an Administrator appointed by the President under article 239, and no legislature of its own (The Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu (Merger of Union Territories) Act, Ministry of Law and Justice).

The scheme guidelines put a price on that absence. Where a state has to find 40% of the bill against the centre's 60%, and the North Eastern states along with Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh have to find 10 against 90, a Union territory without a legislature finds nothing at all, because the guidelines provide 100% of the funds from the centre (PM-YASASVI scheme guidelines, Department of Social Justice and Empowerment). There is no matching territorial share for a file to wait on.

What the territory owns is everything operational. The same guidelines leave the scheme to be implemented and administered under the procedures and local conditions laid down by the Union Territory Administration, and put the detailed procedure for selecting students in its hands, subject only to not contradicting the guidelines themselves. In practice that means the Social Welfare Department decides when to advertise, which office answers questions, and how the paperwork moves.

Where the record turns thin is money actually moving. Table 5.1.18 of the Ministry's Annual Report 2025-26, the state-wise financial table for the pre-matric limb, gives this territory an asterisk and a nil entry in both of its columns, neither an amount sanctioned nor a mother sanction generated, and the note under the table reads that asterisk as funds that could not be disbursed because of issues such as SNA SPARSH and the non-submission of complete proposals (Annual Report 2025-26, Department of Social Justice and Empowerment). The same asterisk sits against the territory in the post-matric table on the page that follows, so it is not a quirk of one limb. A second note explains that actual beneficiary data reaches the Ministry only with the implementing agency's proposal for the following year, which is why no count of children paid under this scheme in this territory exists in print.

Parliament has asked how many students here reach the portal at all. The answer given on 11.03.2026 counted 32,848 applications from this Union territory over five years and 3,273 scholarships awarded to students on diploma, graduate and postgraduate courses, and its annexure names the 22 Union Government schemes those applications ran under, this pre-matric limb not among them (Lok Sabha Unstarred Question 3044, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology). Neither figure describes a Class IX or Class X award, and the reply does not claim otherwise.

Who runs it

Provider

At a glance

Key details

Calendar

Important dates

The territory has advertised for the current year, and the date that binds a family sits in its notice rather than in the guidelines' calendar. The Social Welfare Department issued that notice at the end of July 2026, inviting fresh and renewal applications for the Central Sector and Centrally Sponsored schemes it runs on the National Scholarship Portal and copying it to the FPO for publication in the local newspapers. Its annexure carries the timeline for this scheme.

Running past the model calendar is the habit here rather than the exception. For 2020-21 the department advertised in November and then extended the last date for submission of applications to 31 December, 2020 (Social Welfare Department advertisement, UT Administration of Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu). The schedule every participating state and territory is asked to follow looks nothing like either year.

Both calendars are real and they answer different questions. The guidelines' dates govern money moving between the centre and the territory; the notice's dates are the ones a Class IX student in Silvassa can actually miss.

Who can apply

Eligibility criteria

The gate is narrow and it is the school that closes it first. Only students studying in Class IX and X on a full-time basis in Government Schools are covered, and the award is sanctioned where the parents' or guardians' income from all sources does not exceed Rs 2,50,000 per annum (PM-YASASVI scheme guidelines, Department of Social Justice and Empowerment). The student has to be an Indian national and to hold a valid certificate as OBC, EBC or DNT, with the last read as denotified, nomadic and semi-nomadic communities not already counted under SC, ST or OBC.

The territory publishes the same test in its own words, which is the version a school here works from. The annexure to the Social Welfare Department's scholarship notice sets the scheme out for Class IX to X at Rs 4000 per annum and puts four conditions against it: a valid certificate for one of the three categories, domicile of the Union territory, the income line the guidelines fix, and full-time study in a government school. That annexure also files the attendance rule under eligibility rather than under renewal, requiring a regular attendance record of not less than 75% in the previous year (Social Welfare Department scholarship notice, UT Administration of Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu).

Domicile decides who pays. The guidelines award the scholarship through the government of the state or Union territory the applicant belongs to, meaning where the child is domiciled, so a family settled in Dadra and Nagar Haveli or in Daman or Diu applies to this administration rather than to the state where a relative lives.

One more line catches families who apply widely. Two educational scholarships cannot be held together for the same Class IX or Class X year; where a second one is offered, the choice belongs to the student, and the head of the institution has to be told which way it went. The income certificate itself is taken once only, at the time of admission.

Who cannot apply

Exclusions

Drawing any other pre-matric scholarship at the same time puts a child outside this one. Repetition is the second quiet disqualifier: because a class carries the award only once, a child held back in Class IX draws nothing for the second run at it.

The school holds the first cancellation power. Where its competent authority is satisfied that a student has broken school discipline or any condition attached to the scholarship, the award can be suspended or cancelled, and the Union Territory Administration may also cancel it directly on reasons of its own. Falsifying a claim ends more than the claim: cancellation is immediate, whatever has been paid is recoverable, and the child is debarred from every scholarship scheme for good.

Sons are capped and daughters are not. Only two boys of the same parents or guardian may draw the scholarship, and awards taken by girls of the same household do not count against that ceiling.

Continuation

Renewal conditions

Nobody in the family fills a second form. The instruction to the portal is blunt, that there should be no requirement for the student to apply for renewals, and the year turns over on two confirmations from the school, that the child was promoted and that the child came back. The award stays payable until the student passes Class X, subject to satisfactory academic performance and attendance of 75% in every academic year, verified through an Aadhaar-based attendance system, with the institution uploading attendance every month until such a system exists (PM-YASASVI scheme guidelines, Department of Social Justice and Empowerment).

One absence is forgiven by name. Where illness kept a scholar out of the annual examination, renewal stays open, on a certificate from the prescribed authority that the school is willing to take. That makes the school, not the department, the point of failure for a Class IX award carrying into Class X: if the attendance record or the promotion confirmation does not go up, nothing renews on its own.

What you get

Award & benefits

The figure is a single consolidated academic allowance of Rs 4000 per annum, and it does not move by class, by district, or by whether the child boards or goes home. Say the vintage out loud: that rate sits in the PM-YASASVI guidelines drawn for the period 2021-2022 to 2025-26 (PM-YASASVI scheme guidelines, Department of Social Justice and Empowerment), and the Ministry restated the same allowance among the scheme's salient features in its Annual Report 2025-26 (Annual Report 2025-26, Department of Social Justice and Empowerment).

The missing boarding rate is easiest to see against the scheme listed beside this one in the department's own notices. For the pre-matric scholarship for Scheduled Caste students in this territory the department publishes Rs 3500 per annum for a day scholar and Rs 7000 for a hosteller, with a further 10% for a Divyang student (Social Welfare Department scholarship notice, UT Administration of Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu). None of that structure exists here. One figure is paid, whoever the child is and wherever the child sleeps, and a higher number quoted from the scheme next door is not this scheme's number.

Payment is by direct transfer and nothing else. The entire amount, whatever its origin, goes into the account of the student or the parent only through DBT, preferably through the Aadhaar Payment Bridge, so a bank account that is not seeded to the child's Aadhaar is a payment that will not land.

• Coverage Value of Scholarship: The students shall be given a consolidated academic allowance of ₹4,000/- per annum.
• Note: The entire scholarship amount both from the State and Central Government will be paid directly into the account of the students or parents ONLY through DBT preferably through an Aadhaar Based Payment System (Aadhaar Payment Bridge-AePS).

What to prepare

Documents required

The list a family has to produce got shorter this year. For the current round the department names the compulsory documents as a valid caste certificate issued by the competent authority, a valid income certificate, and a domicile certificate where one applies, each to be uploaded in original only, with a UDID number on top of that for a Divyang student. It then withdraws the third for this scheme outright: for the SC and OBC scholarship schemes administered by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, submission of a domicile certificate is not to be insisted upon, in accordance with Government of India instructions (Social Welfare Department notice for academic year 2026-27, UT Administration of Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu).

Hold that against the scheme record on this page, which still carries a domicile certificate on its list of documents required. Both are accurate. The record describes the scheme as designed; the notice is the instruction the office in Moti Daman is currently working to, and it is the later of the two.

The notice does not leave the certificate counter to chance either. It goes to the Mamlatdar in each district with a request to facilitate the timely issuance of the certificates these schemes call for, and to the Assistant Director of Education for circulation to every institution.

The guidelines describe a different world from the one that notice operates in. In the arrangement they set out, the system takes no certificate uploads whatever: a caste, income or domicile record is pulled straight from the database of the office that issued it, through digilocker or an equivalent mechanism, keyed on the Aadhaar number. Until that linkage exists the originals are still scanned and still uploaded, which is exactly what the department is asking for.

Step by step

How to apply

The application does not travel from the family to the portal. Applications for the current academic year are invited from eligible students through the Headmaster, Principal or Institute Nodal Officer of the school, and it is that officer who has to see that eligible students file on the National Scholarship Portal, verify what they file against the scheme guidelines, and forward it to the District or State Nodal Authority inside the published timelines (Social Welfare Department notice for academic year 2026-27, UT Administration of Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu).

The school has a gate of its own to clear, and it moved this year. Registration is shut to any institution without a valid UDISE+, AISHE or NCVT code, and where the code exists but the KYC registration was never finished, the two officers who hold the school's portal account have to pass a face authentication once that form is in. A school that merely changes either officer has to get the Aadhaar details updated through its District or State Nodal Officer and go through the authentication again. Students register once too: a One Time Registration number, generated from an Aadhaar number or an enrolment ID, has to exist before the application form can be filled, and it stays with the child for the rest of their academic career.

The guidelines add the timing the school is meant to work to. Students apply on the portal on the same day they are admitted, the institution confirms on that day that the child is a bonafide student, and where manual verification is still being done it is to be completed within 30 days of the application, with presumed approval if it is not (PM-YASASVI scheme guidelines, Department of Social Justice and Empowerment).

Following the File After the School Signs Off

Application status and payment tracking are separate services on the portal, which also publishes district-wise and scheme-wise nodal officers and a list of Grievance Redressal Officers (National Scholarship Portal, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology). The guidelines put a Grievance Redressal Officer inside every institution and escalate anything the institution fails to settle in time to the district and then above it. Locally, the scholarship correspondence runs through the department's own scholarship cell, whose address and telephone number are in the Contact section below.

How winners are picked

Selection process

Nothing here is competitive. Once the eligibility test is met, the guidelines turn selection into an outreach duty on the administration: identify the poorest eligible households from various sources and enrol those students in mission mode, taking in particular children from households with three or more deprivations on the socio-economic caste census, and children where one or both parents are illiterate. Two floors are set on the outcome rather than the process, with at least 5% of the scholarships covering students with disabilities and 30% of the beneficiaries reserved for girl students (PM-YASASVI scheme guidelines, Department of Social Justice and Empowerment).

The constraint behind all of it is the funds-limited design. Each financial year the Ministry conveys a notional allocation to the territory based on population, and the territory is asked to send its proposal within that allocation, which is exactly the step the Annual Report's footnote identifies as having failed here.

Fine print

Terms & conditions

Aadhaar is the identity document for the scheme under the Ministry's notification number 428 dated 16.02.2017, and authentication is compulsory at renewal if it was not done at admission; where authentication fails, the applicant is to be allowed to establish identity by other means so that a genuine claimant is not shut out. Administrative cost, which pays for portal work, social audits and the publicity the territory is expected to run through panchayat notice boards and parent-teacher meetings, is limited to 1% of the annual scheme cost (PM-YASASVI scheme guidelines, Department of Social Justice and Empowerment).

A child is not meant to move schools in the middle of a year. The guidelines allow it only where circumstances are exceptional and the move serves the child's academic career, and they reserve to the Government of India the right to change the scheme's provisions at any time.

The territory flags a classification change for the current round. Scholarship schemes are now sorted into merit-based and welfare-based, and a student may hold one merit-based scholarship alongside one or more welfare-based ones, subject to each scheme's own eligibility conditions (Social Welfare Department notice for academic year 2026-27, UT Administration of Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu). That classification does not withdraw the guidelines' own bar on a second educational scholarship for Class IX or X, so the safer course is to ask the department before counting on two awards.

Get help

Contact

Correspondence about this scholarship goes to the Social Welfare Department's scholarship cell at Vidhyut Bhavan, Kachigam, on 0260-2230854, or by email to socialwelfaredaman@yahoo.com (Social Welfare Department scholarship notice, UT Administration of Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu). The notices themselves now issue over the signature of the Director-cum-Deputy Secretary (Social Welfare/WCD) and reach schools through the Assistant Director of Education in each district.

If a query goes unanswered, the department is also an RTI address. For the Social Welfare Department office at Silvassa, the Central Public Information Officer is the Secretary (Social Welfare), DNH & DD, and the first appellate authority is the Deputy, Joint or Additional Secretary (Social Welfare) (List of CPIOs and appellate authorities, Dadra and Nagar Haveli district administration).

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.

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