Aga Khan Foundation International Scholarship Programme 2026/27: Postgraduate Guide

Some scholarships are best understood by what makes them different, and the Aga Khan Foundation International Scholarship Programme (AKF ISP) is different in a way you must grasp before you spend one hour on an application: an AKF award is half grant and half loan. Half of the money is a gift you never repay. The other half is a loan — with a service charge, a guarantor, and a repayment schedule that begins six months after you graduate. The Aga Khan Foundation states this structure openly on its own programme page, and this guide will state it just as openly, because students who apply believing the AKF ISP is a conventional fully funded scholarship are misunderstanding one of the most respected postgraduate funders in the developing world. Understood correctly, the programme is something arguably more interesting: a fund of last resort, running since 1969, that exists to close the final funding gap for outstanding postgraduate students from a defined set of developing countries who have exhausted other options — and to recycle repayments so the next generation can be funded too.

This guide covers the AKF ISP for the 2026/27 cycle and the cycle that follows it, using the Aga Khan Development Network’s official programme page as its primary source. You will learn which countries the programme serves — including Bangladesh, India and Pakistan — why it is postgraduate-only with priority for Master’s degrees, why PhD funding is limited to the first two years, what “genuine financial need” and a “multi-source funding plan” actually mean in this competition, how the local-office application system works (there is no global online portal in the way most scholarships have one), why the deadline falls at the end of March, and how the loan half is repaid. The official page records that the 2026-2027 application cycle is now closed and the next cycle opens in early 2027 — so this guide is written to get you ready for that opening, with the whole preparation strategy that a January-to-March window demands.

One more framing point, because it decides whether you should apply at all: AKF describes its own programme as a resource of last resort, and awards are made according to need to students who have no other means of financing their studies. This is not a merit prize to stack on top of a comfortable funding package. It is a competitive, small-cohort fund — a limited number of new awards each year, supporting more than 1,500 students across its history since 1969 — for academically excellent candidates whose remaining obstacle is genuinely money. If that description fits you, read on carefully: few funders reward a well-constructed, honest financial plan the way this one does.

Aga Khan Foundation International Scholarship at a Glance

If you are building a funding plan across several programmes — which, as you will see, this scholarship actively requires you to do — our scholarships directory and study abroad guides will help you map the other pieces: university scholarships, government schemes and employer or community funding that can sit alongside an AKF award.

What the AKF ISP Is — and What It Is Not

The programme was established in 1969 and is run by the Aga Khan Foundation, part of the Aga Khan Development Network (AKDN). Its stated purpose is precise: to give outstanding scholars from selected developing countries, who have no other means of financing their studies, the chance to pursue postgraduate education at reputable institutions, and to develop effective scholars and leaders — with an expectation, woven through AKDN’s development mission, that graduates will contribute to development, primarily in their home countries and in fields relevant to AKDN’s focus areas. Award recipients are chosen through a global, annual, competitive process, and only a limited number of new awards are made each cycle. This is a small, deliberate programme, not a mass scheme.

Equally important are the things the AKF ISP is not. It is not an undergraduate scholarship. It is not a travel grant — international travel is explicitly excluded. It is not family funding — dependants’ costs are excluded. It is not a top-up for students already mid-degree: you must be starting the first year of your programme, and students who have already enrolled in or commenced postgraduate study are not eligible. It is not available for part-time programmes or short courses. And under the current official page, it is not available for study in the United Kingdom or Russia — a restriction that surprises many applicants who assumed a famous London or Edinburgh offer was the natural target. If your only admission is to a UK university, the AKF ISP cannot fund it; you would need a different funder for that offer (our guide to the Aga Khan Foundation Scholarship sits within a wider set of postgraduate funding guides for exactly this kind of comparison) or a different, AKF-eligible destination for your degree.

Finally, a misconception worth correcting at the start: despite the Aga Khan’s role as Imam of the Shia Ismaili Muslim community, the AKF ISP is not restricted by religion. AKDN serves people irrespective of origin, faith or gender, and the programme’s eligibility criteria are nationality, residence, academics, need and programme fit — not faith. Students of every background from the eligible countries apply and are selected.

Eligibility: Countries, Residence and the Seven Tests

Geographic scope — check this first

The official page lists the programme as available in: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Egypt, India, Kenya, the Kyrgyz Republic, Madagascar, Mozambique, Pakistan, Syria, Tajikistan, Tanzania and Uganda, and notes Australia and New Zealand among the countries where the programme operates. In Canada, Portugal and the USA, applications are accepted from people who are originally from one of the listed countries. The page also states plainly that at this time the AKF ISP is not available to students who wish to study in the United Kingdom or Russia.

Layered on nationality is a residence rule that many hopeful applicants miss: AKF only accepts applications from eligible nationals who are residing in a country where there is a local AKF, AKES or AKEB office that processes applications and interviews candidates. In practice you apply where you live, through that country’s office, and each office runs its own intake. If you are a national of an eligible country but living somewhere with no processing office, use the eligibility tool on the official page — it exists precisely to route you to the correct local contact — before assuming you can or cannot apply.

The seven eligibility tests

The official page sets out the criteria as a list. To be eligible for an AKF ISP award, you must:

• have excellent academic records;
• hold a Bachelor’s degree or equivalent training/professional experience;
• demonstrate genuine financial need;
• demonstrate a thoughtful, reliable, multi-source funding plan that covers all years of study;
• be admitted to a reputable postgraduate institution;
• be starting the first year of the programme; and
• have strong leadership potential, professional experience, extracurricular and/or entrepreneurial achievements, and volunteer contributions.

Preference is given to young professionals under 30. In selection terms, AKF’s published criteria across its programme materials emphasise consistently excellent academics, genuine need, admission to a highly reputable programme, and the relevance of your field to AKDN’s focus areas — areas that include education, health, rural development, economic development, civil society and culture — together with coherent educational and career plans and evidence that you can succeed in a foreign academic environment. Applicants are generally expected to have some years of work experience in their field of interest, which is why the programme describes its ideal candidate as a young professional rather than a fresh graduate: a 24-to-29-year-old with a strong degree, two to five years of relevant work, a reputable admission offer and an otherwise unbridgeable funding gap is the profile this fund was built for.

Master’s priority, PhD limits

AKF gives priority to Master’s-level requests. PhD applications are considered for outstanding students — the programme’s materials describe candidates who are highly recommended for doctoral study by their professors and who need the PhD for academic or research career objectives — but PhD funding is provided only for the first two years, after which you are expected to find funding from alternative sources. Do not build a four-year PhD plan that assumes four years of AKF money; build it with the two-year limit inside the plan, and show your post-year-two funding route in your multi-source plan. Local and regional universities, and distance-learning programmes, are acceptable to the ISP where the quality of the course is maintained — an important and often overlooked point: the institution must be reputable, but it does not have to be in North America or Europe, and a strong regional university with lower costs can make your funding plan more credible, not less.

Benefits and the 50/50 Award: What the Money Looks Like

Work through a simple example to see why the structure matters. Suppose your reputable Master’s programme costs, across its full duration, the equivalent of USD 40,000 in tuition and student living expenses, and you have assembled USD 15,000 from a university bursary, family contribution and savings — leaving a gap of USD 25,000 that you ask AKF to close. If AKF awards the full gap, USD 12,500 is grant and USD 12,500 is a loan you will repay over five years beginning six months after graduation, with the service charge applied per your agreement. That is still powerful funding — half of the gap is free money, and the loan half is structured development finance rather than a commercial bank loan — but your post-graduation budget must include the repayment from month seven onward. Applicants who present this arithmetic in their funding plan, rather than discovering it at the signing stage, are demonstrating exactly the financial seriousness AKF selects for.

Note also what is not in the table: there is no published standard monthly stipend, no standard award ceiling quoted on the official page, and no travel budget. Any agent or website quoting you a guaranteed AKF award amount is inventing it. Your award is individual, need-assessed, and set by the process — which is why the quality of your financial documentation is an academic matter in this competition, not just an administrative one.

Programmes and Fields: What AKF Likes to Fund

The AKF ISP funds full-time postgraduate programmes at reputable institutions, with Master’s degrees at the centre. Within that, AKF’s selection materials give weight to the relevance of your field to AKDN’s focus areas — broadly, the fields that build a developing country’s professional base: education; health and public health; agriculture and rural development; economic development, economics and enterprise; engineering and the built environment/infrastructure; civil society, governance and public policy; and culture and heritage. This is not a closed list published as a rule, and strong applications in other fields are not automatically excluded, but the logic of the fund is development impact: the clearer the line from your degree to a development outcome in your home country, the more naturally your file fits the programme.

Three programme-shape rules are hard rules, not preferences. First, full-time only in effect: applications for part-time programmes are not considered. Second, no short courses: short-term certificates, diplomas of a few months and executive short courses are outside the programme. Third, first year only: you must be starting the programme; if you have already begun your degree, this fund cannot adopt you mid-course. Add the geographic rule — no study in the UK or Russia under the current page — and the two-year PhD cap, and you have the boundaries inside which your study plan must be drawn. Students who need a UK destination should compare this with the grant-based routes in our rankings and funding comparisons rather than trying to bend AKF’s rules; students whose plans are flexible will find that excellent reputable programmes in Canada, the USA, Europe (outside the UK), and strong regional universities all sit comfortably inside AKF’s map.

How to Apply: The Local-Office System, Step by Step

The AKF ISP does not work like a centralised online scholarship. There is no single global form on a website that everyone completes. Applications are handled by local contacts in the countries where the programme operates — AKF offices, Aga Khan Education Services, or Aga Khan Education Boards — each of which issues its own application materials and interviews its own candidates. The official AKDN page provides an eligibility tool: you use it to verify your eligibility and learn how to contact your local team. Your steps therefore look like this.

1. Verify eligibility early — ideally in the autumn before the cycle. Use the eligibility tool on the official AKDN international scholarships page to confirm that your nationality, residence and study destination fit, and to identify your local office contact.
2. Contact your local AKF / AKES / AKEB office. Ask for the current cycle’s application form, the office’s exact deadline (the cycle deadline falls at the end of March, but offices set their own submission handling — do not assume you can arrive on 31 March), and any country-specific requirements.
3. Secure your university admission in parallel. You must be admitted to a reputable postgraduate institution, so your university applications must run months ahead of the AKF cycle: for a January–March AKF application, most candidates need offers (or near-final admission) from universities whose own deadlines fell in the preceding autumn. This sequencing is the single biggest planning challenge of this scholarship, and Section 7 returns to it.
4. Build your multi-source funding plan. Document every other source: university scholarships and assistantships applied for or awarded, government or employer support, family contribution, personal savings. AKF explicitly asks you to treat the ISP as a last resort and to reduce the amount you request by securing other sources — a plan that says “AKF pays everything” contradicts the programme’s own instructions.
5. Complete the application form obtained from your local office, covering your academics, your programme and institution, your career plan and your full financial picture, honestly and with documents to match every figure.
6. Assemble and submit your supporting documents (next section) to the office from which you obtained the form, before that office’s deadline — the cycle closes at the end of March.
7. Attend the interview if shortlisted. Local offices interview candidates. Expect to be tested on your academic choices, your development rationale, the realism of your funding plan and your intention to apply your degree — prepare as you would for a competitive fellowship interview, because that is what it is.
8. If awarded, complete the award formalities: the award agreement, including the loan component and your guarantor’s co-signature, and the office’s disbursement requirements. Read the service charge and repayment terms before signing; ask questions at this stage, not later.
9. During your studies, maintain the conditions: good academic standing and continuing financial need, with the reporting your office requires. Your award’s continuation depends on both.

Throughout, keep copies of everything and keep your contact details current with the local office. Because administration is local, the relationship with your country office — its emails, its deadlines, its document preferences — is your application infrastructure. Our application guides and planning tools can help you organise the parallel university-application calendar that feeds into this cycle.

Required Documents

Your local office’s form pack is the authoritative list, and packs differ slightly by country. Across the programme, applicants should be ready to provide:

• The completed AKF ISP application form obtained from your local AKF/AKES/AKEB office.
• Academic transcripts and degree certificates demonstrating an excellent record, including your Bachelor’s degree (or evidence of equivalent training/professional experience).
• Proof of admission to a reputable postgraduate institution for a programme starting in its first year — your offer/admission letter, with programme, start date and duration clear.
• A full financial dossier: your programme’s tuition and living-cost figures, documentation of your family’s financial position, and evidence supporting your claim of genuine financial need.
• Your multi-source funding plan: letters or evidence for every other funding source (university awards, employer support, family contribution, savings), showing how all years of study are covered in combination with the amount you request from AKF.
• A statement of your educational and career plans — why this programme, why this institution, and how it connects to development in your home country and to AKDN’s focus areas.
• Evidence of professional experience, leadership, extracurricular/entrepreneurial achievement and volunteer contributions (employment letters, certificates, references).
• Recommendation/reference letters as your office’s pack requires; for PhD applicants, strong professor recommendations are especially significant given the programme’s stated test for doctoral support.
• Identification and nationality/residence documents proving you are a national of an eligible country and resident where you are applying.
• For successful candidates at the agreement stage: a guarantor able to co-sign the loan agreement.

Deadlines and Application Timeline

The AKF ISP runs once a year. The official page states that the 2026-2027 cycle is closed and the next cycle opens in early 2027; AKF’s established cycle information places the application deadline at the end of March (31 March), with awards decided around mid-year. The decisive feature of this calendar is not the March deadline itself — it is what must exist before March: a reputable admission offer and a documented funding plan. Both take months. Plan backwards from March, as the table below does.

If you miss the March window, you miss a full year — there is no second intake. Students who discover the AKF ISP in February with no admission offer should treat that year as a preparation year and aim at the following cycle, rather than rushing a thin file into a competition that rewards completeness. Used well, that extra year also lets you add the work experience and the parallel funding awards that strengthen both eligibility tests.

Selection Criteria and How to Improve Your Chances

AKF’s published selection logic rewards five things in combination: consistently excellent academics; genuine, documented financial need; admission to a highly reputable programme; relevance of the field to AKDN’s focus areas; and a candidate who presents coherent plans, relevant experience and a realistic prospect of succeeding abroad and contributing afterwards. Your application improves when every element supports the others.

Concretely: choose the most reputable programme you can genuinely enter and explain the choice — AKF funds reputation and quality, including strong regional institutions, not brand-collecting. Write a career plan with a return trajectory: the sector, the type of institution, the problem you will work on. Make your finances boringly transparent — income, obligations, other awards, the exact remaining gap — because in a need-based competition, an unverifiable story scores below a documented smaller one. Apply for every other plausible funding source first and show the letters; AKF says outright that it is a last resort, so evidence that you have knocked on other doors is evidence you understood the assignment. If you are a PhD applicant, secure professor recommendations that specifically argue why you need the doctorate for an academic or research career — that is the programme’s own test for doctoral support — and show your funding route for years three and beyond. And if you are 28 with three strong years of work experience, do not undersell it: this fund prefers young professionals, and relevant experience is part of the eligibility list, not decoration.

Common Mistakes

• Treating the award as a full grant. Half is a loan with a service charge, a guarantor and a five-year repayment starting six months after graduation. Budget for it from the day you sign.
• Applying for undergraduate study. The ISP is postgraduate only. Undergraduate readers should look at programmes designed for them, such as the IsDB Scholarship programmes for eligible countries or the ICCR Scholarship for study in India, both of which include Bachelor’s routes.
• Building the plan around a UK offer. Under the current official page, the ISP is not available for study in the United Kingdom (or Russia). A UK-only plan cannot be funded by AKF.
• Asking AKF to be your only funder. The programme instructs applicants to secure multiple sources and request only the remaining gap. A single-source plan argues against itself.
• Applying after starting your degree. You must be starting the first year; students who have already commenced postgraduate study are ineligible, with no discretion to appeal the point.
• Short courses and part-time programmes. Neither is considered. If your target is a nine-month part-time certificate, this is the wrong fund.
• Forgetting the excluded costs. Travel, family living costs, clothing and furniture are not covered. Candidates who arrive having spent their last savings on tuition deposits discover the travel exclusion at the worst moment — plan a separate travel and settlement budget.
• Missing the local-office step. There is no use polishing an application you never formally obtain or submit: forms come from, and return to, your local office, and its deadline handling governs your file.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is the Aga Khan Foundation Scholarship fully funded?

No — and the Foundation is transparent about why. The award covers tuition and student living expenses, but it is structured as 50% grant and 50% loan: you repay half of the total award, with a service charge, over five years beginning six months after graduation (per the programme’s published loan terms). It also excludes international travel and family costs. It is substantial, structured support — not a full free ride — and it should be evaluated as such.

Which countries are eligible for the AKF ISP?

Per the official page, the programme operates in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Egypt, India, Kenya, the Kyrgyz Republic, Madagascar, Mozambique, Pakistan, Syria, Tajikistan, Tanzania and Uganda, with Australia and New Zealand also listed among the countries where it is available. Applicants in Canada, Portugal and the USA are accepted if they are originally from one of the listed countries. You must also be resident where a local AKF/AKES/AKEB office processes applications, and the programme is not available for study in the UK or Russia.

I am from Bangladesh. Can I apply, and where?

Yes — Bangladesh is a core AKF ISP country, and Bangladeshi postgraduates are one of the programme’s established applicant groups. You apply through the Aga Khan Foundation’s local office structure in Bangladesh: use the eligibility tool on the official AKDN page to confirm your eligibility and obtain your local team’s contact, then request the current cycle’s form pack and its deadline from that office.

Does AKF fund PhD studies?

Yes, but selectively and with a hard limit. Master’s applications have priority; PhD applications are considered for outstanding students who are strongly recommended by their professors and who need the doctorate for academic or research careers. Funding covers only the first two years of a PhD — you must show alternative funding for the remainder in your multi-source plan.

Do I need to be Ismaili or Muslim to apply?

No. Eligibility is based on nationality, residence, academic excellence, financial need, admission and programme fit. AKDN works with people irrespective of origin, faith or gender, and students of all backgrounds from the eligible countries are selected.

When is the deadline for the 2026/27 cycle?

The official page records the 2026-2027 cycle as closed, with the next cycle opening in early 2027. AKF’s cycle runs annually with forms available from local offices from January and the deadline at the end of March (31 March). Because local offices administer applications, confirm the exact submission deadline with your own office as soon as the cycle opens.

Can AKF fund me if I have already started my Master’s?

No. You must be starting the first year of your programme; the official page states that students who have already enrolled in or commenced postgraduate studies are not eligible. If you are mid-degree, look for funders that support continuing students instead of spending a cycle on an ineligible application.

What is a guarantor, and why does AKF require one?

Because half of your award is a loan, AKF requires a guarantor to co-sign the award agreement — a person who stands behind your repayment obligation. Repayment, including the service charge, begins six months after graduation, termination of studies or withdrawal of support, and runs over five years under the programme’s published terms. Discuss the responsibility openly with your intended guarantor before you apply; it is a serious commitment for them as well as for you.

Sources & Verification

This guide is based primarily on the Aga Khan Development Network’s official programme page, International Scholarships — AKDN, which sets out the programme’s history (established 1969; more than 1,500 students supported), eligible countries and the UK/Russia restriction, the seven eligibility criteria, the under-30 preference, Master’s priority and two-year PhD funding limit, the exclusions (travel, clothing, furniture, family living expenses; no part-time or short-term programmes; first-year starters only), the half-grant/half-loan award conditions with guarantor and repayment trigger, and the status of the 2026-2027 cycle (closed; next cycle opens early 2027). Loan detail published in AKF programme materials — the 5% annual service charge and five-year repayment period — is identified as such in the text and flagged for confirmation against your own award agreement. Further programme information appears on the Aga Khan Foundation’s agency pages at akdn.org.

Disclaimer: AKF ISP details, country availability and deadlines are set per cycle and administered locally; always confirm the current cycle’s terms, forms and deadline with your local AKF/AKES/AKEB office and on the official AKDN page before applying. StudyGraduate is an information portal, not an agency, and cannot guarantee selection, admission or visa approval for any applicant.