after assuming his diplomatic mission in January this year, Ambassador
Adhikari held meetings with the AIT president, as well as Nepalese
faculty members and students. The ambassador stressed that would like
to see like to see a larger number of students from Nepal enrolled at
AIT.
Calling on AIT President Prof. Worsak Kanok-Nukulchai at a meeting also
attended by AIT Board of Trustee member Mr. Noritada Morita senior
administration officials, the ambassador expressed his thanks on behalf
of the embassy and the people of Nepal for AIT’s financial, technical
and humanitarian response to the April 2015 earthquake disaster.
The president, in turn, congratulated the ambassador on the recent
enshrinement of Nepal’s new constitution. President Worsak also
emphasized the ample ties that bind AIT with Nepal in terms academics,
research, outreach and human capital.
Briefed on details of Nepal’s historical engagement with the institute,
highlighted by the fact that six percent of AIT’s 21,000-plus alumni
hail from Nepal, the diplomat, who is also a member of the AIT Board of
trustees, invited suggestions for increasing the number of Nepalese
students attending AIT. Here, the ambassador indicated his government’s
support for any potential student scholarship mechanism Mr. Morita may
be able to facilitate from Japan.
Amb. Adhikari noted that AIT remains a popular higher education brand
in his country. He added that he personally knew a number of Nepalese
AIT alumni, including the very first Nepali national to graduate in
1973.
President Worsak also agreed to try to strengthen and increase
engagement between AIT and Nepal across academics, research, capacity
building and expert solutions. Specifically, he asked Nepal to support
the institute by seconding faculty from top universities to teach and
conduct research at AIT. He followed with a request of financial
support for student fellowships, as a means to partially subsidize
students’ tuition fees.
The ambassador to Thailand said he would follow up on these requests,
as well as an earlier proposal submitted by AIT which made the case for
support of regular governmental scholarships through official budgetary
means.
Ambassador Adhikari added that he would review the modalities of AIT’s
proposal for secondment of Nepalese faculty.
Agreeing that AIT is a useful regional higher education platform for
his country, the ambassador affirmed that he would communicate with
Kathmandu on the possibility of utilizing available funding sources to
support human resource development opportunities for Nepali
citizens.
