Sacramento, California, USA: Four Indian-American students have been awarded the prestigious Rhodes Scholarships for 2026, allowing them to begin fully funded postgraduate programs at the University of Oxford starting next October.
This year’s awardees—Aruna B. Balasubramanian, Anil A. S. Cacodcar, Shubham Bansal, and Anirvin Puttur—were selected from a pool of 965 candidates nominated by colleges and universities across the United States.
Balasubramanian, who hails from Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania, is completing her final year at Yale University, where she studies anthropology and history. Her thesis focuses on how arts-driven initiatives in a Japanese fishing village have supported local development. She leads an undergraduate digital humanities journal and works as a trainee guide at the Yale Centre for British Art. She plans to enrol in the Master of Philosophy in Global and Area Studies at Oxford.
Cacodcar, from Lafayette, Louisiana, is a senior at Harvard University, majoring in economics and human developmental and regenerative biology. His research analyses how local media report on fentanyl and how such coverage connects to overdose patterns. He heads the Harvard Public Opinion Project, which conducts one of the nation’s largest surveys of youth political opinions. His prior roles include work with the Council on Foreign Relations, the Pew Research Centre, and Boston Healthcare for the Homeless. He will pursue a Master of Philosophy in Economics at Oxford.
Bansal, who comes from Mukilteo, Washington, is a senior at the University of Washington, specialising in neuroscience and medical anthropology. He founded NARCARE, a nonprofit dedicated to training certified naloxone instructors and expanding access to overdose response tools across the country. He also serves on the Washington State Department of Health’s Mental Health and Social Justice Committee. His research at the Benaroya Research Institute links autoimmune diseases to immune responses to SARS-CoV-2. At Oxford, he aims to study for a Master of Science in Health Service Improvement and Evaluation.
Puttur, originally from Gilbert, Arizona, is completing his studies at the U.S. Air Force Academy, majoring in aeronautical engineering and applied mathematics. His work with the German Aerospace Centre examines pitch-recovery performance in future fighter aircraft. He is also an instructor pilot and flight commander in the 94th Flying Training Squadron and performs nationally with the academy’s aerobatic demonstration team. Multilingual and musically trained, he will pursue a Master of Science in Engineering Science.
Established through the will of Cecil Rhodes, the Rhodes Scholarship is one of the most respected and competitive international postgraduate awards. It supports exceptional students from partner nations to undertake advanced studies at the University of Oxford with full financial coverage.
