When The Public Pays For Your Oxford Dream

Students strapped for cash are turning to crowdfunding platforms to make their foreign education dreams come true

- Himanshi Dhawan

If ever the future could change in three hours, it did on June 1 for Dalit rap artist Sumit Samos. A few days earlier, the Odisha government had rejected his scholarship application for his masters at Oxford University. A disheartened Samos had all but given up hope, when a friend suggested crowdfunding. He decided to give it a shot, figuring the dream of going to Oxford was dead anyway.

But the universe had other plans. Money poured in with Samos reaching his goal of Rs 28 lakh in just three hours. “It was much beyond my expectations,” he says. With money still coming in, Samos has revised his target to Rs 47 lakh that will not just meet his tuition costs but his living and travel expenses as well.

Not everyone reaches their target so fast but crowdfunding is becoming a go-to strategy for more and more Indian students, especially the underprivileged, who want to go to uni without amassing a mountain of debt. Some do it after being rejected for loans like social activist Harshali Nagrale whose bank loan, as was Samos’, was turned down by a bank for lack of collateral. Nagrale has got admission to a masters programme in election, campaign and democracy at the Royal Holloway, University of London for which she needs Rs 36 lakh. She says she has been taken aback by the support she’s getting from strangers on the crowdfunding platform. “I had collected around Rs 40,000 when I checked just before going to bed. When I woke up, it was Rs 2 lakh. It was overwhelming to see the faith people had in me. Now I feel that my dream is possible,’’ says the 26year-old from Ballarpur in Maharashtra who is a first-generation learner. “I have completed all my education on scholarships,” she says.