Mangalore : U Ramdas Kamath, chairman of Scholarship Award Ceremony said that Vishwa Konkani Student Scholarship Fund, organized by World Konkani Centre, Mangalore was awarded ‘Merit Cum Means Scholarships’ worth Rupees Two Crore to over 1300 students from economically backward family.

Speaking at the press meet held at Hotel Ocean Pearl after the award distribution ceremony held at TV Raman Pai Hall on Aug 25, Saturday. He said that Hon’ble Member of Parliament Oscar Fernandes in the presence of T.V. Mohandas Pai, Chairman, Manipal Universal Learning distributed scholarships for 480 Engineering and MBBS students.

He also said that ‘Vishwa Konkani Student Scholarship Fund’ envisages grant of educational scholarship to economically backward students having Konkani language as their mother tongue. VKSSF has successfully raised and distributed Rs. 50 Lakhs to 162 deserving students in the year 2010 and Rs. 1.00 Crore to 547 students in 2011. VKSSF has now evolved in to a large Scholarship Programme with over 1300 beneficiaries and Rs. 2 Crore worth of Scholarships in the year 2012. He also said that by 2020, the centre aims to give scholarship to 25,000 scholars.

The scholarship fund is given by Eminent Konkani Philanthropists like T.V. Mohandas Pai, Dr. T. Ranjan Pai, K. V. Kamath, Ramadas Kamath U., Jagannath Shenoi, Dr. P. Dayanand Pai, Ronald Colaco, Madam Grace Pinto, A. Annappa S. Kamath, Rohan Monteiro, Pradeep G. Pai, he said.

A network of referees and verifiers across the country comprising of Doctors, Chartered Accountants and Educationists worked towards selection of over 480 most deserving and meritorious students from Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra and Goa belonging to different castes and religions with Konkani as their Mother Tongue.

Vishwa Konkani Student Scholarship Fund has designed a new scheme to support educational quest of PUC and Degree Students with an outlay of Rs. 40 Lakhs.

Mr Kamath also said that, VKSSF will also support the aspirations of Konkani Students who want to pursue their advanced education in reputed universities abroad, VKSSF has instituted a Study Abroad Scholarship Programme. This year 10 Such Students will be awarded Rs. 1.00 Lakh each under the programme.

Secretary Pradeep G. Pai,  founder and the president Basti Vaman Shenoy, Ganapathi Pai and T V Mohandas Pai were presentr at the press meet.