The Oxford India Centre for Sustainable Development (OICSD) at Somerville College is launching a new scholarship for Indian students from lower caste backgrounds and/or first-generation students. This is the UK’s first fully-funded graduate scholarship geared towards Indian students from these underrepresented backgrounds.
According to a tweet from the OICSD, the scholarship will “support the next generation of leaders from Dalit, Adivasi and other underrepresented background”. The college and the OICSD established this scholarship in recognition of “the effects of historic and current caste-based discrimination and prejudice including household poverty and lack of opportunity as well as lack of information, advice and careers guidance in multiple spaces.” The Phule Scholar will participate in the centre’s academic and leadership workshops and receive access to the OICSD’s large alumni network.
The scholarship is “inspired by the pioneering work eradicating gender and caste barriers to education” of Savitrabi Phule, a nineteenth century social reformer and education activist. The 2023 Phule scholar will be part of the wider cohort of OICSD scholars.
The OICSD is a research hub that focuses on issues like climate change and healthcare. Launched in 2013 through a partnership between the Government of India and the University of Oxford, the centre honours Somerville College’s “strong links with India by supporting a community of Indian students who would otherwise not be able to take up their place at the University”. The OICSD aims to facilitate “engagement across sectors on sustainable development issues with India, UK and beyond” and its alumni include numerous leaders in sustainability and development in India
Jan Royall, Principal of Somerville College explains that Somerville’s “motto of including the excluded extends to people who have been subject to generations of social discrimination and prejudice under the caste system, and it is thrilling to think that these scholarships will offer brilliant young people from these under-represented groups a platform by which to change the world”.
The inaugural Phule scholar will be Niharika Singh, who will study who will take an MSc in Nature, Society and Environmental Governance programme at the School of Geography and the Environment, starting in October 2023. Singh expressed her gratitude towards the University and the OICSD, adding “the opportunity will immensely support my larger goals of contributing in inclusive community development,”.
Singh hopes to represent the Dalit community and “bridge the gap between environmental stability and caste marginality in India”. She underscores that “Dalits in India are invisible from the broader discourse of the environment as issues concerning accessibility to natural resources, discrimination and multidimensional vulnerabilities are largely unaddressed in the current environmental policy and discourse in India.”
 at Somerville College is launching a new scholarship for Indian students from lower caste backgrounds and/or first-generation students. This is the UK’s first fully-funded graduate scholarship geared towards Indian students from these underrepresented backgrounds.){kind=link}