LAGATAR24 NETWORK
Ranchi, March 3: The Jharkhand government in collaboration with the Sarojini Damodaran Foundation on Friday awarded the Vidyadhan Scholarship, a Shibulal Family Philanthropic Initiative and scholarship letters to the first batch of students from Jharkhand. The letters were handed over by the Director, of the Department of Higher Education Garima Singh and Vidyadhan National Programme Director Meera Rajeevan.
The students that received that scholarship include those students that have scored 75 per cent or 7.5 CGPA marks in the 10th boards, and their annual family income is less than Rs two lakh per annum. Under this, Rs 10,000 will be given per year to the selected students for education in intermediate.
Notably, the Vidyadhan scholarship was given by the Sarojini Damodaran Foundation with the support of the Education Department of Jharkhand. The foundation which was started by Kumari Shibulal (patron) and SD Shibulal, co-founder of Infosys; has already invited applications for the scholarship programme. Since its inception in 1999, the scholarship has been given to 26,700 students. At present 5090 students are benefitting from the scholarship.
As per information, the foundation was able to reach out to a reasonably large number of meritorious students from economically disadvantaged families in 2022, the year of its launch in the state. Officials claimed, “We are grateful for the support that enabled us to reach out to the students studying in class 11 in the state, especially those enrolled in government schools, and gave us the confidence to identify needy and deserving students.”
The officials further added, “Vidyadhan received more than 600 applications from Jharkhand. We have completed the selection process for 2022, which included online tests, interviews, house visits, and document verification, and are happy to inform you that this year we are providing 111 scholarships to students from Jharkhand. Out of these 111 students, 36 students were first-generation learners; both of their parents were illiterate. These students will be provided scholarships and mentoring by Vidyadhan if they continue to do well academically, till they complete their graduation. Every academic year, we will be adding a new set of students who are selected through a similar process.”
Talking to the media, Vidyadhan National Programme Director Meera Rajeevan said, “The response to the scholarship in Jharkhand in its first year has been very good and there was excellent support from the state education department. We have got student representation from all 26 districts in Jharkhand. In the coming years, our focus is to reach out to more girl students and tribal areas. In addition to financial support, we also plan to provide career guidance, employability skills training and mentoring to the students till they complete graduation.”
