Vidyasiri food And Accommodation Scholarship Scheme(VFASS)

The scheme follows Karnataka's post matric scholarship calendar rather than a calendar of its own. For 2026-27, one date is live right now:

Closing dates in the Vidyasiri family have moved mid-cycle before: the minority-side scheme once pushed its closing date to 10/01/2022, per the Directorate of Minorities, and the department's notice is where any change becomes official. An extension is a reprieve, not a plan; apply inside the announced window.

Beyond the residence and category conditions the official record lists, the department pins eligibility to three numbers. The family income ceiling and the marks needed to enter the scheme both depend on the applicant's category, as published on the BCWD Vidyasiri page:

The third number is distance. The department's page asks for students from rural areas whose home sits at least 5 km from the college of study, and it carves out an exception for a student whose home town and college town are different cities. A student attending college in their own neighbourhood is not who this stipend was designed for.

The official record names three published disqualifiers, and the department's own page shows what each one looks like in practice. Repeating an equivalent course is the one that catches most applicants: the scheme page gives B.Com after B.A., a second M.A. in another language and LLB after B.Ed as its worked examples. The medical exclusion applies to a student who practises medicine while pursuing a postgraduate or medical course. Changing courses more than once ends eligibility outright. Two quieter conditions sit on the same page: only two sons of one family can hold the benefit, with no such cap on daughters, and a student already admitted to a departmental or government-aided hostel is outside the scheme by definition.

Vidyasiri is sanctioned one academic year at a time, and the department invites applications afresh for each year, so a continuing student files again in the current window rather than carrying an earlier sanction forward. Where the sources part company is the marks bar that second application has to clear. The BCWD page publishes its 55% and 65% thresholds only for availing the facility the first time, while the scheme's central listing on myScheme records separate minimum marks for fresh and for renewal students, and the two sets of figures do not agree. Rather than pick between them, go by the thresholds printed in the year's own notification and shown against your application on the State Scholarship Portal, because that is the version the department verifies your result against.

The award is a flat stipend, not a fee reimbursement. A selected student receives Rs 1,500 a month for the 10 months of the academic year, a total of Rs 15,000, credited by RTGS to a bank account in any core banking bank, as the Backward Classes Welfare Department puts it, "subject to other conditions". Nothing in the published scheme varies the amount by course, year of study or category; a first-year PUC student and a final-year degree student draw the same Rs 1,500. Tuition, exam fees and books are outside this scheme's scope.

The record's document list is short, and the portal is what gives it teeth. Karnataka's SSP application takes the caste and income certificates as RD numbers issued by the Revenue Department, and the portal carries a "Check your RD number Details" lookup for exactly that step. Three preconditions that no document list mentions stop Vidyasiri applications cold. Aadhaar seeding of the bank account is, in the portal's own words, "mandatory for submission of application and to avail scholarship". An NSP One Time Registration number is mandatory for the Backward Classes Welfare Department's schemes, so a Vidyasiri applicant registers on the National Scholarship Portal before applying on the state one. And your university or board has to have published the previous year's result to the National Academic Depository, because the portal states that publication is what lets an OBC student's application be displayed for approval.

Applications move online through the State Scholarship Portal. On ssp.karnataka.gov.in, a first-time applicant creates an account, signs in through the postmatric login meant for Class 11 and above, and selects the Vidyasiri Food and Accommodation Scheme listed under the Backward Classes Welfare Department. The scheme's official record lists no other application route, and the department's notices point at the same portal.

Tracking runs inside that same login rather than on a public status page: sign back into the postmatric login you applied from and the application's stage shows there. If it reads sanctioned and nothing has reached the bank, open the NPCI Aadhaar-seeding status link the portal keeps under Important Links, since SSP disburses through DBT into the beneficiary's Aadhaar-seeded account and an unseeded one has nowhere to receive the credit. For anything the screen does not explain, the SSP helpline listed on the department's post matric scholarship notice is 1902.

The department does not publish a ranked selection rule for Vidyasiri beyond the eligibility tests; its page states the conditions and leaves sanctioning to verification of the application. What does exist is a category-wise reservation of the grant pool: the scheme's central listing on myScheme records that grants are allocated by fixed percentages across Category-1, 2A, 3A and 3B rather than by an open merit ranking, so a student competes within their own category's share.

One published condition deserves more attention than it gets. The BCWD scheme page states that a student can avail only one of the facilities it lists, the post matric scholarship or the food and accommodation scheme, so a family should decide which benefit fits the student's situation before filing. The Rs 15,000 is also paid "subject to other conditions" in the department's own wording, which the page does not spell out beyond the eligibility tests printed above it. What the published scheme does not attach is worth knowing too: no bond, no service obligation and no repayment clause appears anywhere in the department's page or the scheme's central record.

The department and the portal staff separate queries. Scheme-level questions go to the Backward Classes Welfare Department at bcwd.scholarship@karnataka.gov.in or its helpline 8050770004; portal and application trouble goes to the SSP team at postmatrichelp@karnataka.gov.in or the 1902 helpline. Both run on office timings of 10:30 AM to 5:30 PM, per the department's 2026-27 notice.