PM-CARES for Children: Centre announces benefits for kids orphaned by COVID-19

Prime Minister on 29 May announced that those children who have lost both parents or surviving parent or legal guardian/adoptive parents due to COVID- 19 will be supported under the ‘PM- CARES for Children’ scheme. 

PM- CARES for Children’ scheme will take care of their educational needs, including higher education. Prime Minister chaired a meeting to discuss steps needed for such children and also announced a number of benefits for children impacted by the current pandemic.  

Contribution in PM CARES' will be through a specially designed scheme to create a corpus of Rs 10 lakh for each child when he or she reaches 18 years of age, which will be used to give a monthly financial support from 18 years of age, for the next five years to take care of his or her personal requirements during the period of higher education. 

On reaching the age of 23, he or she will get the corpus amount in a lumpsum for personal and professional use, said PMO in a statement. The scheme will also take the responsibility for the educational requirement of such children, as they will be given admission in the nearest Kendriya Vidyalaya or in a private school as a day scholar. 

Apart from this, if the child is admitted in a private school, the fees as per Right to Education law will be given from PM- CARES, added the PMO. It will also pay for uniform, text books and notebooks. Moreover, children in the age bracket of 11- 18 will be given admission in Central government residential schools such as Sainik School, Navodaya Vidyalaya and others. 

In an effort to ensure access to higher education, the scheme will help in getting education loan for professional courses or higher education in India as per the existing education norms. The entire amount of interest on this loan will be paid by PM- CARES. The PMO added an alternative scholarship similar to the tuition fees or course fees for undergraduate or vocational courses as per government norms will be provided under Central or state government schemes. 

For those children, who are not eligible under existing schemes, PM CARES will provide an equivalent scholarship. The scheme will assure enrollment of such children as a beneficiary under Ayushman Bharat Scheme (PM-JAY) with a health insurance cover of Rs 5 lakh. Premium for these children till the age of 18 years will be paid by PM CARES.