There are thousands of undergraduate scholarships available for students in India. These scholarships are patronized by various organization, institutions and even individuals. The basic purpose of these undergraduate scholarships in India is to alleviate some of the financial burden of students and encourage them to advance their studies in engineering, medical, science, arts & commerce and management streams. However, due to some misconception and lack of awareness a huge number of students don’t apply for scholarships and the scholarships amounting to crores of rupees remains unclaimed.

Undergraduate scholarship may be broadly categorized as:

• Undergraduate scholarships‬ for General Category ‎students‬ in India
• Undergraduate scholarships for SC, Scholarships for ST & OBC students
• Undergraduate scholarships for differently-abled students
• Undergraduate scholarships for girl students
• Undergraduate scholarships for minority students

These scholarships can further be divided into need-based, merit-based, need-cum-merit based and pure academic based scholarships.

Basic criterion for availing undergraduate scholarship:

The basic criterion for availing undergraduate scholarships is that the student must have passed his Higher secondary certificate (HSC) exam and he must be pursuing undergraduate studies from government recognized institution or University.

In case of need-based scholarship there is some limitation on annual family income. While there is no such condition in case of merit-based scholarship. While granting need-cum-merit based scholarship the sponsoring organization may also take into consideration student’s financial need besides his academic performance. The amount and number of scholarships offered may depend upon the sponsoring institution and funds available with them.

Again there are few scholarships which are exclusively reserved for minority community, differently abled candidates, and girl students. In order to qualify for such scholarships you must meet the basic criterion laid down by that scholarship providing organization. E.g. for minority scholarship you must belong to one of the minority communities notified by central Government, for disability scholarship you must have at least 40% disabilities as per definition under persons with disabilities act 1995 and to apply for girls scholarship one must be a female candidate.

How to apply for undergraduate scholarships:

In order to apply for scholarships you must first get yourself registered with scholFin.com (scholarship search engine). ScholFin will not only narrow down your online search for undergraduate scholarships in India but will also help you to select the most appropriate scholarships that exactly matches with your profile. Once you have registered yourself on site and have become an active member of ScholFin you will receive notification in the form of emails or mobile alerts from time to time for the scholarships that you qualify for.