Israel beckons Indian students

John Joe Vattathara, a student from Bangalore, won a full scholarship to study B.Sc. in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from Tel Aviv University (TAU), Israel. He received the scholarship and student visa recently in the city.

Professor Ehud Heyman from TAU said, “Tel Aviv University is ranked amongst the 10 leading entrepreneurial institutes worldwide and studying in TAU will give immense exposure to students in different fields.”

Consul General Menahem Kanafi, who gave away John’s student visa, said, “Both Indian and Jewish cultures prize education as one of our highest values. Israel has an excellent higher education system, with fully three-quarters of its universities placed in the top 100 in Asia, and one-fourth in the top 150 schools in the world. In this sense, we are glad to be able to cooperate with Indian students in order to educate the leaders of tomorrow.”

Other scholarships

India-Israel Joint Academic Research Programme: As part of government-to-government initiatives, India and Israel launched a new funding programme of joint academic research in May 2013, the first round (covering 2013-14) of which has its focus on exact sciences (mathematics, theoretical chemistry, theoretical physics, theoretical computer sciences, computational biology) and humanities (archaeology, theatre, cinema, television, cultural studies, religious studies).

Under this programme, each government is contributing $2.5 million annually for five years. The programme will provide support for nearly 100 collaborations (spread over 2013-18) and provide up to $ 300,000 for an experimental project, or $ 180,000 for a theoretical project, for up to three years. The fund is being administered by the University Grants Commission (UGC), India, and the Israel Science Foundation.

Fellowships

The Israeli government has also been offering annual post-doctoral fellowships to about 100 students from India and China since 2012 under which each student is awarded an annual scholarship of NIS 100,000 (about $ 29,000) to pursue research in one of the eight research institutions in Israel.

Of the 180 fellowships awarded during 2012-13 under this programme, over 140 have been awarded to Indian students.

30 beneficiaries

In addition, the Israeli government has been offering 250 summer scholarships to undergraduate students from India and China since 2013 to spend a month at the eight research institutions in Israel.

In its first cycle last year, about 30 Indian students utilised this scheme.

The Israeli government also offers seven scholarships to Indian students every year at graduate level: five general scholarships and two for Hebrew language study.

The scholarships are offered for eight months (one academic year) to graduate students under the age of 35 to pursue programmes in universities and programmes approved by the Israeli Council for Higher Education.

September 21, 2014

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