'Lakshmi comes and goes but Sarasvati stays forever': New scholarships bring good fortune to OCHS students

 

Two Asvatta Narayana scholarships were awarded at a special lunch marking the end of the Michaelmas term for OCHS students old and new. Dr Giri Rajagopalan formally presented cheques to Mr Rembert Lutjeharms from Belgium and Mr Kiyokazu Okita from Japan, explaining that she and her husband set up the scholarship because 'Lakshmi comes and goes, but Sarasvati stays forever.' The award is named after her father who came from a village where no one could afford higher studies, but who went on to achieve great success in his own work so that his children would have the the benefits of a good education.

 

Further scholarships have now been set up to help OCHS students. One of the Centre's first alumni, Dr Ravi Gupta, who was also one of the Centre's first PhD graduates and one of the youngest-ever students to gain a PhD at Oxford University, has now set up an annual scholarship of £1000 per year with earnings from his first permanent lecturing position. Dr Gupta, who gave the keynote speech at the 2006 Board of Governors Dinner at Oxford Town Hall, has won a permanent lectureship at Centre College, Kentucky. He set up the award with the goal of aiding existing students, and inspiring them to give back to the Centre. He said "The OCHS is a like a second home - without it many students would not have gained their degrees from Oxford. It makes sense to give back to an institution that has given so much."

 

Another invaluable annual scholarship for £1108 has been kindly donated by Raj and Ramila Chauhan, friends of the OCHS. The OCHS is hoping that the Pundit Abaji Scholarship will make study in Oxford possible for a deserving Indian student.

 

Finally, thanks to another longstanding friend and supporter of the Centre, one student will be awarded the TGPF scholarship for £500 in the coming term. Set up "to assist a capable and worthy student" with his or her studies, the TGPF scholarship was set up to commemorate the hard work of the benefactor's father who believed that the "the best way one can help a fellow human being is by education." The donor wishes to remain anonymous.