How to spot a scholarship scam

Signs it is a scam

• It asks for a registration, processing or application fee. Government scholarships do not charge students. A Common Service Centre may charge a small fixed service fee for helping you file, and on NSP that rate is published on the portal itself, but the scholarship itself is free.
• It guarantees selection. Nobody can guarantee a scholarship.
• It asks for your bank OTP, UPI PIN or full card details. No scholarship ever needs these. Money comes to you, not from you.
• It arrives as a WhatsApp forward with a shortened link and no official domain behind it.
• It is a scholarship test run by a coaching institute where the real product is the coaching.

What a real process looks like

• The scheme lives on a government portal or the provider's own website
• The link ends in gov.in, nic.in or the provider's real domain
• You are asked for documents, never for money
• The money arrives in your bank account through DBT

If you already paid someone

Stop any further payment, keep the messages and receipts, and report it on the national cybercrime portal at cybercrime.gov.in.

When in doubt, open the official portal yourself rather than following a link someone sent you.