New Delhi, Jun 15 (IANS): Students from the Muslim community received about 80 per cent of total scholarships offered under 20 Central government schemes in 2018-19, official data shows.

Those from the Christian community came in at second place with 7.5 per cent share while it was 5 per cent for Sikhs and 4.7 per cent for Hindus, according to the National Scholarship Portal managed by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology.

More than 1.4 crore applications were received in 2018-19, of which 1.08 crore were verified.

Among the students who received scholarships, 88 lakh were Muslims, 8.26 lakh Christians, 5.45 lakh Sikhs and 5.2 lakh Hindus.

There were 1.94 lakh (1.8 per cent) Buddhists and 1.07 lakh (1 per cent) Jains in the list of beneficiaries.

The total amount disbursed under these scholarship programmes sponsored by 14 Union Ministries was Rs 2,157 crore in 2018-19.

Of the total amount, Rs 1,032 crore was spent on scholarships for Muslims students while Rs 183 crore was spent for Sikhs and Rs 128 crore for Hindus.

The Ministry of Minority Affairs topped the list of allotments with 77 per cent scholarships of the total offered.

Ministry Of Labour and Employment, Department of Higher Education, Department of School Education and Literacy, Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities also featured among the top five.

West Bengal, Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, and Kerala were the top five states to receive scholarships.

In terms of the amount received under these scholarships, Uttar Pradesh came first with Rs 356 crore, followed by West Bengal at Rs 281 crore.