After Two Master’s Degrees in India and Norway, Indian Student Chooses HSE for Doctoral Studies in Political Science
Ashish Kumar Singh hails from a place called Raebareli, a city of about 3,000,000 people located in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. He recently joined the doctoral programme in Political Science at HSE, a decision he says was motivated by discussions he had with a professor from HSE who was visiting the Russian Centre for Science and Culture in New Delhi.
‘I looked through the profiles of various professors at HSE and wrote to many of them with my research interests. Finally, Professor Mikhail Ilyin agreed to be my guide for the Ph.D. programme’, he said.
Since joining HSE, Ashish has been working closely with his supervisor, Professor Mikhail Ilyin, on various themes of public policy and political science, which he considers a promising field that increasingly drew his interest while pursuing two separate Master’s degrees – one in Social Entrepreneurship from at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences in Mumbai and the other in International Social Welfare and Health Policy from the Oslo and Akershus University College of Applied Sciences in Oslo, Norway.
After completing his second Master’s in Oslo, Ashish stepped away from academics for four years to spend time working with civil society organizations in India. Coming back to academics has been a challenge for him, although he credits the experience of having already studied in a foreign country as making the transition less difficult.
‘Funding seems to be the biggest’, he notes when asked about the challenges he is facing. ‘I am still figuring out ways to secure better opportunities, as I want to devote all my energy to absorbing and producing knowledge in my field’, adding that he eventually hopes to secure an academic job or a post-doc position.
As for adjusting to daily life in Moscow, like others from extreme climates, he quickly points out the weather. ‘Let me say that I am an Indian and we have great survival skills. In summer 2017, I was in New Delhi with the temperature of 45 degrees above zero and within six months I am in Moscow with -10 degrees! Making friends has also helped with my adjustment.’Admissions for tuition-free doctoral studies at HSE are open until March 31, 2018. You can apply online.
Anna Chernyakhovskaya, specially for HSE News service
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