IDFC FIRST Bank calls for MBA scholarships to 2022 batch

By Priyanka Pani

India’s leading private lender IDFC FIRST Bank has announced the opening of its MBA Scholarship programme for the batch of 2020-2022.

The scholarship, a part of the bank’s corporate social responsibility program, is available to MBA aspirants across the country. It aims to financially support students from weaker social economic backgrounds, enabling them to pursue a management degree from a B-school of their choice. The programme was instituted in 2016 and so far 530 students from both urban and rural India have benefitted from this programme.

The initiative provides financial assistance to students so as to ease the burden of fees payable by them and to make admission to the best colleges and universities accessible to economically weaker students. About 150 scholarships will be granted by the Bank this year.

To qualify for the scholarship, the candidate needs to secure admission into a two-year full-time MBA programme and the family income has to be less than INR 600,000 per annum. The initiative provides financial assistance to students so as to ease the burden of fees payable by them and to make admission to the best colleges and universities accessible to economically weaker students. About 150 scholarships will be granted by the Bank this year.

Rachana Iyer, Head – Corporate Social Responsibility, IDFC FIRST Bank said, “We believe expenses of MBA are rather high and even meritorious students often drop out from pursuing their careers because of financial difficulties. Through this initiative, we aim to lend a shoulder with Rs. 2 lakh per student for two years, to students from vulnerable communities, to pursue higher education and to attain a higher standard of living.”

The scholarship supports students from over 150 B-Schools all across India. Since the number of applications far exceed the number of scholarships, the Bank prioritises and ranks-orders the applications for scholarships based on criticality of need, which may involve factors such as family income, socio-economic background and other such criteria.