Our Anchors

Message from the Chairman

Mr. Gopal Varutharaju

Year 2021 was hard hit by the impact of the pandemic from 2020. The world including Singapore came to accept the fact that the pandemic will linger for a few more years. Singapore while adapting to the emergence of newer strains of the Covid, had also introduced many financial measures to help the Singaporean household and businesses. The restriction measures imposed had also impacted SIET’s fundraising activities drastically. Our marque Charity Golf event had to be postponed yet another year. SIET had been consistently raising more than $100K from the Charity Golf in the pre-pandemic years and the loss of income for the past 2 years had negatively impacted our financials. SIET’s fundraising committee resorted to reaching out to many institutions to raise funds that yielded some success. SIET’s investments yielded about 3% from its investments in lowrisk bonds and due to unpredictable market conditions, it is noted that returns from our investment portfolio is expected to decrease in the coming years. The fundraising committee is now looking at various other means to raise funds consistently knowing that the pandemic may last a while longer.

In terms of finances, SIET in collaboration with SINDA had disbursed bursaries amounting to $539,950 to 367 students. It had given out interest free study loans worth $ 316,930 t0 79 students in 2021. SIET felt the impact instantly as many parents had either to face a salary cut or even lost their jobs. We faced an increase in the number of students requesting for financial assistance. There was almost a 20% increase in the bursaries that were disbursed in 2021. It is expected that this trend may continue in the coming years. SINDA had been a great partner in supporting SIET again in 2021 through matching the bursaries amount. SIET and SINDA have been working closely to address the spike in students who are requesting for more financial assistance due to challenging family circumstances. The amount of tertiary loans disbursed had stayed constant against the 2020 figures. The nature of this trend are not understood since there was an 8-10% year-on-year increase for loan applications before 2020. All student applications are reviewed by the admin staff and MC members before initiating their respective interviews which is mandated as part of our approval process. SIET managed to continue their interactions with the students virtually through zoom since the government restrictions were imposed. The interview panel that comprises the MC members and about 10 volunteers had to adapt using zoom to provide motivational tips to these students which is much more effective in a face-to-face session. 2022 is an elections year and SIET will be looking at renewal of the MC team. We will bid farewell to some of our long serving MC members, notably is Vice-Chairman Mr. Puvanaratnam Ariaratnam who had been serving for over 2 decades, followed by our other Vice-Chairman, Mr. Rajasegar who had been serving SINDA and SIET for over 2 decades as well. SIET is immensely thankful for their contribution towards guiding the MC team in many of the decision-making process. In line with supporting gender diversity, we are happy to announce the on-boarding of 3 new lady members to the MC team. We hope to continue to get your unwavering support in keeping SIET relevant and assisting as much to support the less fortunate student beneficiaries. I look forward to working closely with all members, the Board, donors and SINDA in bringing the much-needed hope to the less fortunate.

Gopal Varutharaju
Chairman
SIET