The students at the function on Sunday. Picture by UB Photos

Feb. 12: The All Assam Students Union (AASU) today formally handed over AASU Education Cell Scholarships to 160 students from Kamrup (metro) and Kamrup districts.

This is the first batch of students who received the scholarships, meant for meritorious students from economically backward families.

The student body formed an education trust last year to offer the scholarships in a bid to help the beneficiaries continue their studies.

On Wednesday, the scholarships will be given to beneficiaries of other districts in their respective districts.

Secretary of AASU’s education cell Shikhar Sarma said they selected 1,000 meritorious students out of 1,600 applicants for the scholarship. It cost the student body Rs 31 lakh.

A cheque for Rs 4,000 was given to each student who scored over 80 per cent, Rs 3,000 to those who scored between 70 and 80 per cent and Rs 2,000 for those who scored between 60 and 70 per cent in their board examinations.

Besides, Hirakjyoti Baishya and Rikul Bhattacharyya, who have been pursuing engineering course in Assam Engineering College and bachelors in technology at Gauhati University respectively, were awarded Rs 25,000 each as one-time financial assistance.

AASU adviser Samujjal Bhattacharyya said they had been helping students since a long time. “We formed the cell so that we could help students in a systematic way,” he said. He added that the first fund (Rs 5 lakh) of the cell was raised from among their members.

“We are grateful to those who voluntarily donated money to our education cell and helped us support these students. This is a humble beginning. We will cover more students in the years to come,” Bhattacharyya said.

He appealed to the people of the state to donate to their education cell so that more meritorious students could be helped.

Bhattacharyya said the education cell targeted to make a fund of Rs 10 crore so that the students could be given scholarships from its interest.

President of the cell Basanta Deka said they had enquired whether the applicants had electricity supply in their houses or mobile phones to know about their financial condition. “AASU members even visited the applicants’ homes to ascertain their financial condition,” said Deka.

He reminded the students that if their results deteriorated in the next examination, the scholarships would be terminated.

Axam Jatiya Vidyalaya donated Rs 80,000 to the education cell.

Pro vice-chancellor of Tezpur University, Amarjyoti Choudhury, the chief guest at today’s programme, requested the students to work hard, perform better and help other poor, meritorious students once they were established.

Bitumoni Kalita, a first-year English honours student of Pandu College, was one of the recipients of the scholarship today. “This assistance will help us a lot,” she said.