Girl students in IITs set to go up

The number of girl students studying at the Indian Institutes of technology (IITs) is set to go up as official figures show that the percentage of seats secured by them this year has gone up to 15.39% compared to 9.15% in 2017.

Figures released by the Union human resource development (HRD) ministry on Friday, indicate 1,858 girls have so far taken admission in these institutions.

However, only the first round of the admission process, also called as counselling, has been completed so far. The final figure is likely to go up after the seventh and final round of counselling which ends on July 18.

According to the HRD ministry’s plans which were announced in January this year, the number of supernumerary seats for girls in these institutions was hiked to ensure that the number of students in each campus was at least 14%. By 2026, the ministry aims to ramp up seats to ensure the girl student population is at least 20% across each campus. “This is a big step forward in restoring gender balance in IITs. I am sure the impact of this would be felt for many years to come. I thank the IIT community for making this possible...” said R Subrahmanyam, secretary of higher education in the HRD ministry.

The proportion of girls in IITs has been fluctuating over the past few years— 8.8% in 2014 to 9.15% in 2017. Hailing the increase in the numbers, another HRD official said, “This is quite encouraging for the ministry... A number of IITs had held special sessions to inform female candidates about various courses they could opt for and have created special hostel facilities too.”

The decision to increase the supernumary seats was taken after a sub-committee of the Joint Admission Board (JAB) in 2017 pointed out that every year, even though adequate numbers of girls clear the entrance test, their enrollment rate remained low.