The British Council India, the Department of Science and Technology (DST), the Department of Biotechnology (DBT) and Indian Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs) — on behalf of the Department for Business Energy and Industrial Strategy, UK and the Ministry of Science and Technology, India — are pleased to invite applications for funding to support short-term PhD placements between UK and Indian institutions.

The Newton-Bhabha Fund is offering the opportunity for UK and Indian PhDscholars to spend a period of their study (up to two to four months) in Indian and UK higher education institutions, to take place between March 2020 and December 2020.

For more information click here.

UK scholars: the scheme is open only to UK scholars pursuing their PhD at a UK higher education institution (HEI) in areas of STEM and Life Sciences.

Indian scholars: the scheme is open only to Indian scholars enrolled at publicly-funded Indian higher education institutions who meet one of the following criteria:

1. INSPIRE PhD Senior Research Fellows (SRFs) of Batch 2016 are eligible to apply for STEM and Life Sciences subjects.
2. PhD scholars (other than INSPIRE Fellows) who have qualified through a national level test and are in the middle of their second year or third year of a PhD in Life Sciences. The following national level tests are considered: CSIR/UGC-NET, GATE, BET, ICMR-NET, ICAR-NET
3. PhD scholars (other than INSPIRE and those applying for Life Sciences) in their second or third year of a PhD at a publicly-funded Indian HEI which has submitted a response to the British Council’s Expression of Interest (EoI).

The application should be submitted by PhD scholar with endorsement from both the sending and receiving Head of Department (or equivalent) with the latter’s confirmation that they will host the PhD scholars; duration of the stay and level of bench fees if they charge (bench fees is applicable only for UK host universities).

UK applicants apply here

Indian applicants apply here

Please read the call guidelines document available in the downloads section.

To help you to prepare your application, a sample application form is available in the Downloads section below. Please note, the form has been provided for reference only and is not to be used to submit an application.

For full information please click here.