The Associated Students Finance Board allotted $40,473 to 12 student organizations during last night’s brief three-hour meeting.

The board fully funded CLAS, Office of Student Life, UCSB Roller Hockey, Vox California, Chinese Students and Scholars Association, American Students for Israel, ASHA, Laughology, Take Back the Night and Alpha Phi Alpha, while partially funding INDUS and the Israeli-Palestinian Film Club.

INDUS was among the organizations that presented last night, requesting funding for their 15th Annual Vision show. The “Slumdog Millionaire”-themed event, set to occur May 9, will feature dances representative of Indian culture.

Board member Hassan Naveed said this group is an ideal candidate for funding because Finance Board bylaws encourage supporting all events which promote diversity. Naveed also said he did not understand why some organizations are given upwards of $12,000, but this $5,000 budget was being cut down.

“The issue is that we’re telling an organization how to put on an event,” Naveed said. “We’re here to see what’s legal and what’s not. This organization is coming on to put on their biggest event of the year, which raises awareness for their group, culture and the community. … This is only $5,000, in comparison to other events which have been given $10-12,000.”

Moreover, the board debated funding T-shirts promoting the event. Board member Tina Samson said the representative for the club explicitly said T-shirts were more important than costumes for the success of the overall event.

“She said she prefers shirts to be funded over costumes,” Samson said. “She said ‘I’d rather have a high turnout than have no one show up and have good costumes.'”

The board decided to allocate $4,869 to INDUS.

Vox California was among the list of organizations that received full funding. According to organizer Christy Bird, a linguistics graduate student, the weekend workshop is the first conference that focuses on California’s linguistic resources.

“The workshop promotes studies of languages in California as well as highlights California as a social site for the study of languages and social life,” Bird said.

Additionally, Naveed said he was impressed that the event organizers had sought so many alternative sources of funding, raised such a large sum of money and created a comprehensive budget.

“We’re only covering $2,500 out of their $18,000 budget, almost an eighth of their budget,” Naveed said. “The event is open to every student on campus and free for everyone. … This is the first time the conference is taking place in California so it’s important to have our campus on the map in regards to this specific topic.”

Many board members said the event cost too much considering the fact that only about 60 undergraduate students would be in attendance.

Board member Samson, on the other hand, said a large number of students will not be present at the event because not everyone is willing or able to conduct such strenuous research on the topic. She also said that makes the event all the more impressive.

“Few people will attend because it’s a research symposium,” Samson said.