The National Fellowship for Scheduled Castes has been warped in ‘bureaucratic casteism’. The Supreme Court-formed-NTF must take note.

“Justice has always evoked ideas of equality… of proportion of compensation. Equity signifies equality. Rules and regulations, however good they may be, if they fail to achieve this objective, then they are useless.” — Dr. B.R. Ambedkar.THE NATIONAL FELLOWSHIP FOR SCHEDULED CASTES (‘NFSC’), when it was launched in 2005-06, had posed the promise of equity. It was meant to create a space where Bahujan scholars could pursue higher education and research without being pushed aside by systemic disadvantages. Implemented by the National Scheduled Castes Finance and Development Corporation (‘NSFDC’), a government-owned institution under the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, the fellowship was envisioned as a corrective measure to support PhD aspirants from Scheduled Caste communities who narrowly missed qualifying for the Junior Research Fellowship (‘JRF’) by a margin of just a few marks.The design looked progressive on paper. A monthly fellowship of ₹37,000 along with Housing Rent Allowance, equal to the JRF, was supposed to ensure that scholars from marginalised communities had the resources to devote themselves to research. The vision of NSFDC explicitly speaks of “equitable access to higher education and research opportunities” and of nurturing scholars who can contribute to social justice and nation-building.But between vision and reality lies the iron wall of bureaucracy—and for Bahujan scholars, that wall is coated with systemic casteism..It was meant to create a space where Bahujan scholars could pursue higher education and research without being pushed aside by systemic disadvantages..Endless wait, endless humiliationStudents often wait six to seven months after clearing the University Grants Commission–National Eligibility Test (‘UGC-NET’) to know whether their names appear in the NFSC list. The list itself comes after repeated delays, revisions, and errors. When the names finally appear, the nightmare begins.The joining process requires signatures from the university and supervisors, followed by uploads on the NSFDC portal (Scholarship and Fellowship Management Portal). At the university and UGC levels, things move relatively quickly. But when files reach the NSFDC office, they get stuck for 40–50 days, sometimes longer. Even a minor error—like an overwritten date or a missing initial—leads to outright rejection. Students must start from scratch, repeat the entire cycle of verifications and wait another four to five months..Reframing India’s student suicide crisis as a ‘constitutional injury’.This is not the rare story of an individual—it is the recurring experience of hundreds of Bahujan students across the country. Their research is stalled, their mental health deteriorates, and their financial survival becomes uncertain. The very fellowship designed to ease their struggle instead intensifies it.Meanwhile, their upper-caste counterparts with JRF face no such hurdles. For them, approvals are smoother, delays are shorter, and bureaucratic suspicion is minimal. Here lies the systemic casteism of the process: Bahujan scholars are made to feel like applicants pleading for charity rather than equal citizens claiming their right.Bureaucracy as a tool of casteThe bureaucratic indifference of NSFDC is not a neutral glitch; it is a continuation of caste prejudice through administrative means. By subjecting Bahujan students to repeated delays, outright rejections for trivial errors, and opaque procedures, the system ensures that their entry into the world of academia remains precarious and humiliating.This is what many have begun to call ‘bureaucratic casteism’—where discrimination hides not in overt slurs but in policies, delays, and paperwork designed to exhaust the marginalised..The impact is severe. Scholars lose months, sometimes years, in securing their rightful fellowship. Research projects stall. Participation in seminars, conferences, and publications gets compromised. Worse, the psychological toll is immense: students begin to internalise the feeling that their labour, intellect, and future are less valuable.Law, rights, and recent legal developmentsThe constitutional promise of equality under Articles 14, 15, and 21 is not merely abstract—it directly governs the right of marginalised students to access education without discrimination. When state institutions like NSFDC delay or deny timely fellowship disbursal, it does not remain a “technical lapse”; it implicates fundamental rights. The Supreme Court has, time and again, read the right to education and the right to dignity as part of the right to life under Article 21. In Amit Kumar & Ors. v. Union of India & Ors. (2025), the Supreme Court recognised the alarming rise in student suicides across Higher Educational Institutions (‘HEIs’). The Court observed that mental health stressors are not only academic but also deeply rooted in caste discrimination, financial burdens, and administrative neglect. To address this crisis, the Court constituted a National Task Force (‘NTF’) chaired by Justice S. Ravindra Bhat (Retd.), with representatives from key ministries and experts in social justice, women’s studies, psychiatry, and disability rights.The mandate of the NTF is wide-ranging. It is tasked with identifying causes of student suicides—including caste and gender discrimination, financial burden, and scholarship delays; reviewing the adequacy of existing regulations and institutional frameworks around mental health, financial aid, and anti-discrimination; and recommending reforms to ensure accountability and preventive mechanisms within HEIs. The NTF has also been empowered to carry out surprise inspections and consult stakeholders, with a reporting timeline of eight months. This intervention by the Court directly acknowledges that scholarship disbursal failures and financial uncertainty are not mere inconveniences but violations of constitutional rights that may contribute to pushing students towards despair. In this sense, the persistent failures of NSFDC in administering NFSC do not just represent bureaucratic inefficiency—they fall squarely within what the Court now recognises as systemic risk factors requiring urgent redressal..In this sense, the persistent failures of NSFDC in administering NFSC do not just represent bureaucratic inefficiency—they fall squarely within what the Court now recognises as systemic risk factors requiring urgent redressal..The creation of the NTF marks a jurisprudential shift from seeing delayed scholarships as administrative lapses to recognising them as structural discrimination and a constitutional concern. For Bahujan scholars, this shift offers a new vocabulary of rights and remedies. Their struggles are not isolated grievances but part of a national crisis that the top Court itself has begun to address. The Court made it clear that student suicides in India’s universities are not individual misfortunes but constitutional failures. This jurisprudence places a direct duty on the state and its institutions, including NSFDC, to ensure that support schemes like NFSC operate smoothly, transparently, and without discrimination.The NTF also provides a possible pathway forward. By holding institutions accountable, recommending simplified processes, and ensuring that grievance redressal mechanisms are functional, it can directly look into the specific issue of fellowship disbursal. With powers to conduct inspections and demand accountability, the Task Force has the authority to ensure that the administration of NFSC becomes smooth, transparent, and time-bound. In doing so, it can help transform a scheme of exclusion into one of empowerment, aligning its functioning with the constitutional vision of equality and social justice..Dismantling casteism: role of law in protecting students.The way forwardThe solutions are simple, but they require political will and caste consciousness:Time-bound approvals: No student should wait more than 15 days for fellowship disbursal after selection.Correction mechanism: Minor errors must be correctable, not grounds for outright rejection.Transparency and accountability: NSFDC must publish clear timelines, track applications publicly, and hold officers responsible for delays.Student support cells: Dedicated grievance redressal mechanisms must be created for Bahujan scholars so they are not left helpless in navigating bureaucratic traps. Simply providing a helpline number, which is non-functional most of the time, should be stopped; real, accountable and responsive support must replace token measures.These are not favours; they are constitutional obligations. As Dr. B.R. Ambedkar noted, “Justice has always been my religion.” If justice is to mean anything today, it must translate into fellowships that are timely, transparent, and free from discrimination.A broken promiseUntil reforms are made, the National Fellowship for Scheduled Caste students will remain a fellowship in name only. For Bahujan scholars, it represents not empowerment but another reminder that caste follows them into every classroom, every corridor, and every government office. What was meant to uplift continues to oppress—because systemic casteism has the power to hollow out even the most well-intentioned policies. And until this is confronted head-on, Bahujan students will remain where the system wants them: waiting, struggling, and falling behind.

The National Fellowship for Scheduled Castes has been warped in ‘bureaucratic casteism’. The Supreme Court-formed-NTF must take note.

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