Over 25,000 candidates have applied for the recently launched Students’ Credit Card scheme, of which the highest applications have come from Kolkata and North 24 Parganas.
According to an official of the state education department, 1,500 applications have already been sent for bank approval. The credit card will facilitate students to avail of soft loans up to Rs 10 lakh for higher studies. A significant number of students have applied for loans up to Rs 5 lakh and the total loan amount for over 25,000 applicants is around Rs 1,355 crore, said a source.
The scheme has received a huge response ever since chief minister Mamata Banerjee launched it on 30 June. Of the total applications that have been received by the department, more than 3,000 have dropped in from Kolkata alone while another 3,000 is from North 24 Parganas.
Next, over 1,600 applications are from the students hailing from South 24 Parganas. Overall, the response from students of the districts of south Bengal is comparatively higher than their counterparts in the northern districts.
Again, a relatively lesser number of applications have been received from the students of Calcutta University, Jadavpur University and other institutes of the city while more students have applied from Netaji Subhas Open University. Of the 25,000 students who have applied for credit cards, around 5,500 are those who are studying in institutes outside West Bengal.
Over 16,000 applicants are men and the remaining 9,000 are women. Students from class 10 onwards are eligible to apply for this card to get soft loans for pursuing higher education ranging from graduation, postgraduate and PhD.
They can also pursue professional courses like MBBS, BTech, law and diploma courses for skill enhancement. One does not have to provide any guarantor for availing the loan as the state government will be the surety. The loan can be availed at an interest rate of four per cent.
Students can apply for this loan to buy laptops and books and also to pay tuition fees and boarding charges.