Patnaite to join University of California

PATNAVermaAmritaVermaRoliEshaprogramme"Besides me, there is one boy from IIT, Bombay and we will join the course in September this year. Among the total 44 selected students in the physics department, only six are non-US students and among those six, only we two are Indians," Roli told TOI on phone. An alumna of Prarambhika and Notre Dame Academy, she has obtained a graduate division fellowship from the University of California for her further studies and the course fee for the six-year programme will be fully funded.Roli has been a bright and talented student since childhood. She obtained 94.2% in class tenth and 91% in class twelfth. She wrote IIT JEE, the toughest exam of the country and even got through it. However, she was not interested in grabbing the tag of an IITian and earning fat money in any MNC after becoming a graduate. She moved to Bhubaneswar to get admitted into a five year integrated MSc course from National Institute of Science Education and Research (NISER). She said, "I could get into some of the best IITs of the country with the rank I had obtained but I wanted to become an academician instead of becoming an engineer. I would like to research on heavy ion physics."Roli has received the prestigious INSPIRE fellowship from department of science and technology, government of India and Kishore Vaigyanik Protsahan Yojna (KVPY) fellowship in 2009. A resident of Patliputra, she has also done internships at esteemed institutions like Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre in Kolkata, Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai and University of Cologne in Germany.When asked what her future plans are, Roli said she would come back to India only if she gets good faculty positions in the universities here. "In India my work might get limited to data analysis, so after six years whether I would be in India or not, depends on the opportunities available here," she said.