New NMMS regulations upset aspirants in Tamil Nadu

TIRUCHY: National Means cum Merit Scholarship (NMMS) Scheme, the Central Government Scholarship programme, is aimed to provide financial assistance to academically bright students from economically weaker backgrounds and to prevent the dropout rates.

Tamil Nadu fared well in the NMMS this year, with as many as 6,695 students from Class 8 succeeding in the test and becoming eligible for the scholarship. Still, the number was limited to 1,078 from the nine Central districts of the state.

The experts blamed it on the new regulation of total marks cut-off system rather than the previous method of separate minimum marks in the Mental Ability Test (MAT) and Scholastic Ability Test (SAT), which could have increased the number of students from the region.

The Centre has implemented the NMMS from 2009 to help out the students from economically weaker backgrounds and asked each state to conduct a state-level selection test for its respective students.

Accordingly, Tamil Nadu designed the exam pattern with 90 marks each in both the MAT and SAT. A candidate should secure a separate minimum mark of 36 each to get the benefit, and the poor districts like Perambalur, Ariyalur, Pudukkottai, and Nagapattinam had fared well till the 2024 results.

Interestingly, in 2022, Perambalur stood first among the 38 districts with a total of 527 students passing the exam, while in 2023, Perambalur again stood at the top position with 457 students eligible for the scholarship.

However, things had changed from the merit pattern by the introduction of a total marks cut off system in which the minimum cut off was fixed for the general category with 108 marks, the backward class 97 marks, the Most Backward Class 96 marks, and SC/ST 92 marks.

Many students who could achieve separate minimum marks in both the MAT and SAT were not allowed to be eligible, owing to the total marks cut-off pattern.

Out of 2.30 lakh students who appeared for the NMMS, only 6,695 students had passed, and this time, Perambalur dropped to 32nd place in the state.

“Many of us were not aware of the new pattern until the results were out. We prepared the students in such a way to achieve the minimum required marks in both MAT and SAT, and many of them achieved it, but that went futile,” said E Ve Ra from Tamil Nadu Elementary School Teachers Federation.

Meanwhile, the master trainers for NMMS claimed that the education department had not alerted the students who were appearing for the test.

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“Since the system of selection has demotivated the students as well as their teachers, who had been training them for the whole year, the government should withhold the result and re-publish it by following the old method at least for this year,” said K Balashanmugam, a master trainer from Nagapattinam.

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He also said that they had informed the teachers’ unions to take it to the government so that a greater number of economically backward students benefit.