08-07-2025
About 600 Eklavya school students cracked IIT-JEE, NEET exams, says Centre
Close to 600 students from government-run Eklavya Model Residential Schools (EMRS) for Tribal Students across 12 States have cleared top entrance examinations this year for undergraduate studies in medicine and engineering across the country, the Tribal Affairs Ministry's assessment of the EMRS's performance for the year showed.
Officials added that in a special effort to give these students the confidence to proceed with higher education, the Ministry is preparing to reach out to these students with the gamut of government scholarships available to them and handhold the entire application process.
Officials told The Hindu that a total of 596 students of EMRS schools in Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand, Gujarat, Telangana, Odisha, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Maharashtra qualified for either IIT-JEE Mains, IIT-JEE Advanced, or the NEET examinations. One official said this was the first time such data had been compiled for EMRS students, adding that in previous years, 'the number would have been in a few dozen'.
The EMRS is one of the Tribal Affairs Ministry's flagship schemes and the Union government has in the last five years pushed for major reforms in the administration of these schools, including trying to centralise their running, through setting up the National Education Society for Tribal Students (NESTS).
The nearly 600 students who have cleared these entrance exams were coached by coaching centres that have partnered with the NESTS over the last couple of years to provide specific training to students of EMRSs, where tribal students, including students from Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups form close to 85% of the student population.
Outreach programme
In a departure from regular process, a senior government official said the Scholarship Division of the Tribal Affairs Ministry was now looking to start an outreach programme, where all the Ministry's available post-matriculate scholarships for tribal students would be taken to them.
'Usually, they are left to apply for the scholarships themselves. In this case, they have done excellent work, and the Ministry wants to encourage them and give them confidence. So, since both NESTS and scholarships are handled by the Ministry, now the Ministry will track these students and handhold them to get all scholarships they are entitled to,' the official said.
According to the evaluation of the performance conducted by the Tribal Affairs Ministry, 218 students qualified for the IIT-JEE Mains examination, with about 25 of them likely to get in at NITs; 34 students cracked the IIT-JEE Advanced, with 18 of them likely to get into IITs; and 344 students cracked the NEET exam, with at least three of them likely to be placed at AIIMS and most others likely to get a seat in elite government medical institutes.
Union Tribal Affairs Minister Jual Oram and Minister for State Durgadas Uikey held a meeting with NESTS on Tuesday where these results saw both the Ministers praise the efforts of the officials, teachers, and students across EMRSs. They said the scheme, its impact, and its results, needed to be taken to the public.
The Tribal Affairs Ministry, through the NESTS, administers over 400 residential schools across the country, where around 1.38 lakh students are currently enrolled.
