The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) Jammu has registered a formal case (FIR No. 09/2025) under Sections 5(1)(c), 5(1)(d) read with Section 5(2) of the J&K Prevention of Corruption Act, Svt. 2006 and Section 120-B RPC, against M.S. Choudhary, the then Director of Tribal Affairs, Jammu & Kashmir (now retired), and several private individuals and institutions, in connection with gross violations and misappropriation of funds under the Government of India’s Post Matric Scholarship (PMS) scheme for Scheduled Tribe (ST) candidates.
The case as per ACB statement issued to news agency KINS pertains to serious allegations of releasing crores of rupees to unrecognized institutes for unapproved courses between 2014 and 2018, while implementing the Post Matric Scholarship Scheme meant for ST students.
According to the ACB, verification revealed that the Post Matric Scholarship Scheme was launched by the Government of India to provide financial support to ST students pursuing post-matric or post-secondary education. The scheme entailed scholarship payments of ₹18,000 per student, plus ₹2,300 as maintenance allowance, and reimbursement of compulsory fees charged by recognized institutions.
However, the verification found that several private institutes based in Jammu District submitted documents of ST students from remote areas to the Directorate of Tribal Affairs. Without verifying the authenticity of the institutes, infrastructure, or course content, and without ensuring the end-use of the scholarship funds, officials disbursed scholarship amounts worth crores directly to the bank accounts of these institutes.
Further revelations indicate that many of the students in whose names payments were made never sought admission or did not attend the free computer courses. In some cases, the students attended only partially. Despite this, full tuition fees were credited to the accounts of various computer institutes.
One institute allegedly forged documents of ST students from remote villages and filled out scholarship applications in their names to inflate student numbers. In several cases, fake bank accounts were opened in the names of ST students—without their knowledge—to meet the requirement of maintenance allowance disbursement.
Shockingly, some of the institutions were not even accredited by NIELIT or any recognized authority, yet received full payments under the scheme.
Criminal Conspiracy and Misappropriation of Funds
The ACB has alleged that officials of the Directorate of Tribal Affairs, in criminal conspiracy with the owners of private institutes, manipulated records and violated official guidelines of the PMS scheme to siphon off government funds. This large-scale corruption resulted in misappropriation of public money running into crores, thereby causing substantial loss to the state exchequer.
The investigation is ongoing, and further details are awaited.(KINS)
