City doctors crowdfund fee for IIT Delhi aspirant

Time of India

2 days ago

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Nagpur: A group of city doctors associated with Central India Doctors Association (CIDRA) have raised the initial course fee for an IIT Delhi aspirant from Nagpur. The candidate, who wishes to remain anonymous, secured a top AIR in the recently declared JEE results.
However, his dream of pursuing a BTech from IIT Delhi faced a major roadblock as his debt-ridden father was unable to meet the financial requirements for the course.
The boy had secured a 99.961 percentile in his first attempt in JEE Mains and 99.966 percentile in the second attempt last month. The brilliant student had scored 93% in his HSC board exams and 96% in his SSC, even as his family went through financial turmoil in the wake of the Covid lockdown.
When CIDRA members learned about this, they initiated a crowd funding campaign to collect the entire course fee to ensure the boy doesn't drop out midway due to a shortage of funds. Approximately Rs5 lakh has been collected to cover the fee for the first two years and living expenses. Jamaat-e-Islami Hind has also offered financial support.
Well-known cardiologist Dr Kashif Syed, founding member of CIDRA, said raising the funds was a challenge as the family refused to accept 'zakat' (charity) money.
Hence, volunteers were advised to only share non-zakat funds, which they would use to meet their own expenses.
Dr Syed said the boy approached them through his school director to seek financial assistance around two weeks ago, while the last date to pay the first instalment was July 21.
"During the fundraising campaign, I came across a number of queries from different people, each wanting to be sure whether the family is actually 'poor' to qualify for our aid.
While no doubt we should diligently disburse the aid to 'deserving' candidates alone, the definition of deserving should be broadened to include people who are neither too poor nor too rich," said physician Dr Meraj Shaikh, who is treasurer of CIDRA.
Dr Shaikh added that the boy's father had borrowed heavily to infuse funds to revive his small business. "He was not in a position to pay the fee as all income was going into loan repayments.
The father has agreed to take care of fees once his loans are closed in the next two years," he said.
Dr Syed added that CIDRA has been facilitating funding for such meritorious students from the community. "A Kerala boy, who was working part-time to meet his expenses at a medical college here in Nagpur, was helped. CIDRA has assisted two more medical students in Nagpur," he said, adding that such initiatives will continue.