Following the good news early this year where the Madhvani Foundation Board announced Shillings 700 million scholarship fund for the academic year 2015/2016, with Shillings 50million increase compared to last year, over 160 university students have qualified for the scholarships.

The Chairman of the Scholarship committee Mr. Gabriel Opio said, “The Madhvani Foundation Board is pleased to announce the beneficiaries of the 2015/16 academic year for scholarships at both Undergraduate and Postgraduate levels. We are pleased by the growing interest expressed by the number of applications which doubled compared to last year. It is an indication that more students are pursuing sciences. This aligns with our goal of encouraging and enabling science scholars to pursue the much needed disciplines for Uganda’s Labour market”.

Commenting on the demographic distribution of the scholarships Mr. Gabriel Opio, said “The Foundation has awarded 147 Undergraduate and 19 Postgraduate scholarships to students from across the country. Our analysis indicates an 8% increase in the number of beneficiaries this year. The Engineering course came top of the list with a share of 29% of the scholarship fund followed by Medicine and related courses at 21%. Going by the region, the fund was fairly distributed having Eastern Uganda with the highest recipients of 48 Slots compared to 53 slots last year  (representing 29% of the total), followed by Western region with 42 compared to 38 (representing 25% of the total) . Recipients from Central and Northern region tied with 38 each compared to 33 and 28 slots respectively (representing 23% of the total each)”.

Mr. Gerald Ssendawula, Chairman of the Madhvani Foundation Board said, “the Madhvani Foundation Board lives a dream derived from the great grandfather and founder, Muljibhai Prabhudas Madhvani to promote and maintain scientific and technical education among the people of Uganda.  For 12 years now, the Foundation has donated over Shillings 4 billion since 2003 to support over 2000 Ugandan students.”

In conclusion Hon. Jessica Alupo congratulated the beneficiaries present and applauded the Madhvani Foundation for the great contribution to Uganda’s economy by developing relevant human resource capacity. “As government, we appreciate two things, one is the support of the Ugandan science student who cannot afford tuition fees and yet competent; and secondly, a fair distribution of the funds across the different regions of the country, focusing on our local universities which enhances home grown resource”.

Applicants of the 2015/16 scholarships should check the website www.madhvanifoundation.com or print media for the list of beneficiaries. The successful candidates are advised to collect their letters of award from the Foundation headquarters at East African Distributors Ltd, 5th street industrial area from 15th August, 2015.