New Delhi, Mar 26 (IANS): The Ministry of Tribal Affairs will fill 3,479 vacancies in the Eklavya Model Residential Schools (EMRS) in 17 states across the country.

The ministry said in a statement that vacancies will be filled through its autonomous body, the National Education Society for Tribal Students. The application process will be opened from April1.

"The teaching staff in four different posts of principal, vice-principal, PGTs and TGTs will be recruited through a centralised computer-based test followed by inter-views (excluding TGTs) to be conducted by the respective states," the ministry said.

According to the ministry, the recruitment process has been initiated jointly with respective states in order to meet the rising demand of teachers for the vacancies in already functional schools and schools that will be functional this year, calculated after excluding the posts currently filled by regular and ad-hoc or contractual staff.

"Modalities for the existing ad-hoc or contractual staff shall be taken up at a later stage in consultation with the different stakeholders," the statement said.

The EMRS is a flagship intervention to provide quality education to the tribal students in the tribal areas of the country.

"The scheme, in operation since 1998, underwent a major revamping in 2018-19 to improve the geographical outreach of the schools to every block with 50 per cent or more ST population and 20,000 or more tribal persons with an aim to improve accessibility to schools," it said.

Under the revamped scheme, 452 new schools will be set up in addition to the existing 288 schools, thereby taking the total number of schools to 740 in the coming years. Out of these, proposals submitted by the states for opening of 100 schools have been finalised, and the construction work will start soon, the ministry informed.