Each awardee will receive approximately $5,000 per year over four years, and also $5,000 for attending seminars and conferences during the term of the fellowship.

The fellows will also have the option of a three-month to six-month internship at Microsoft Research India.

"There is world-class research talent in abundance in India, but India produces less than 50 PhDs in computer science research every year. One of the objectives of Microsoft Research in India is to enhance the quantity and quality of PhDs in the country, and the PhD Fellowships are a step in this direction," P Anandan, MD of Microsoft Research India, said.

"We will also fund travel to conferences, because exposure to the community and the work it is doing in the subject area is critical for researchers."

After a rigorous selection process, the following five PhD students - G Kannan, IIT Bombay, Deepanjan Kesh, IIT, Kanpur, Animesh Mukherjee, Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, Kaushik Rajan, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore and Ritesh Tiwari, International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad have been awarded Microsoft Research PhD Fellowships for 2006.