"The scholarship scheme for the students who have suffered from the impacts of Mount Merapi`s recent eruptions is the form of UII`s sympathy," the university`s Deputy Rector Bachnas said here Sunday.
The targeted students did not only get their tuition fees waived but they could also receive living cost assistance in order to enable them to continue studying at the university, he said.
Bachnas said the university`s authorities took the data of Mount Merapi eruption survivors that their students` village authorities had released into consideration for the scholarship recipients.
For the eligible students, their tuition fees were waived for one semester or a year, and they were given monthly financial assistance ranging from Rp200,000 to Rp300,000 for three months, he said.
"For UII, this scholarship scheme is part of our concrete response and care for those suffering from the impacts of Mount Merapi`s recent eruptions," he said.
The university authorities, he said, were aware of the great impacts of the volcano`s eruptions on various socio-economic sectors of the people in Yogyakarta and Central Java provinces.
"UII has previously taken the same policy when its students from Yogyakarta and West Java province got affected by deadly earthquakes," he said.
Mount Merapi had erupted repeatedly for several weeks but its most fatal eruptions occurred on October 26 and November 5, 2010.
As a result of the eruptions, at least 259 people had perished and many others sustained serious burns and became displaced.
Mount Merapi, on the border between two provinces, lies geographically close to Yogyakarta but is officially part of Central Java.
Besides killing and injuring several hundred people, eruptions had also damaged 867 hectares of forested land on the volcano`s slopes in Sleman District, Yogyakarta, with material loss estimated at Rp33 billion.
Mount Merapi is one of the most active volcanoes in Indonesia, whose eruptions have regularly been detected since 1548.(*)
Editor: Aditia Maruli Radja
Copyright © ANTARA 2011
