Introduction

Every citizen of India should be able to think clearly, take quick and proper decisions, be alert and develop an attitude to be of held to others. Under proper training and guidance right from childhood, these qualities can be nurtured in children to make them mature and responsible citizens in life. Scouting and Guiding - which is an international movement - intends to inculcate in the young boys and girls a sprit of loyalty, patriotism and thoughtfulness for others. In India, Scouting and Guiding is immensely popular among the school students.

Objective

The term "Scouts & Guides" being a general term, it shall include boys and girls covered under different nomenclature such as "the cubs and the bulbous"; "the scouts and the guides" and "the rovers and the rangers". Accordingly, the admissible age group of the beneficiaries will be from 6 to 35 years.

Pattern of Assistance

The Central grant will be admissible for :

The grant will be non-recurring in nature. The organisation applying for the grant should have the recognition of Government of India as a scouting and guiding organisation with adequate experience, resource and separate legal entity. Government of India grant shall be released only to the Central body of such an organisation - not to its branches, under this scheme. State branches can also seek funds from the state Governments, independent of this scheme. However, there shall be no bar in granting central assistance under other schemes of this Department to such branch offices. The Central body or the National Headquarters of the grantee organisation may share the funds released for conducting programmes with its branches.

“Under the scheme, financial assistance is provided on year to year basis for selected activities such as organization of training camps, skill development programmes, holding of jamborees and other activities like audit literacy, environment conservation, community service, health awareness and promotion of hygiene and sanitation.”

Grants will be released as per the approved action plan for the year. However, the organisation should clearly spell out the whole year’s programme by 30th November of the previous financial year, so that the total admissible grant can be sanctioned well in advance. Only 75% of the sanctioned grant will be released subject to settlement of previous year’s grant, as first instalment and the rest 25% will be released after receiving utilisation certificate.

The entire budget provision under this scheme, shall be spent on three separate heads: (i) Programme : comprising 85% of the plan budget; (ii) Development of Training Centres : comprising maximum 10% of the plan budget which shall be further allocated by the Ministry to the programme side if no viable proposal is received in a particular financial year, and (iii) Research, monitoring and evaluation, experiences-sharing and publication : comprising 5% of the plan budget, Items (a) to (d), (g) and (h) of para 1 above may be considered under the object head of Programme.