Making sure that Girls don't dropout of school:Still a long journey remaining

Recently the president of Niti Aayog Amitabh Kant addressed  Gender Biasness in Education specially higher education that requires providing social, financial and emotional support to girl child.

It is estimated over 2.4crore girls in the world are on brink of dropping out of schools due to Covid -19 pandemic.

Some time ago, the All India Survey on Higher Education report, 2019-20 has been released. Let's see  the figures of this report-

1)  There has been upsurge of 18% in female enrolment  in higher education from 2015to 2019.

2) Among all categories Muslim women are enrolled 40% in HE ( higher education) in 2019-20 as compared to 2015-16. Also the enrolment of ST and OBC category women has been increased 38%and 30% respectively in HE, during period 2015to 2019.

These positive points are not the reason of celebration because the averages hide a plethora of gaps. The share of Muslim and ST women in HE ,despite improvement,is still abysmally low at 2.7% and 2.8% respectively. Women in PWD category occupy only 0.1%of the total HE seats.

Another issue, the master level for arts , science and commerce there has been a sharp increase in female participation b/w2015-2020 as compared to other undergraduate courses like B.B.A. ,B.C.A. , B.Tech or B.E. and LL.B. Females in B.A. and B.Sc. are enrolled 52.9% and 52.3% respectively whereas women's share in the so -called "masculine subjects" is depressingly low at 29.2%.

Women's share in institution of national importance is very low ,only 25%shares rest of the men. Except this , participation of women in STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) fields in India is also very weak.

There are a total number of 993 universities , 39,931colleges and 10,725 standalone institutions are registered on the AISHE portal but the number of female universities in India in 208-19is 16and 10.8% colleges are excessively for girls. At all India level , there are only 73female teachers per 100 male teacher (2018-19).  

Other than this figures, India is among the five worst performing countries in the world in the domain of economic participation of women.

At the ground level ,women in India are not a homogeneous category and their education journey is shaped by socio- religious context. The socio-culture  milieu of  Indian society  magnetize influences on all aspects of a women's life. 

On 8 march 2020 at the ocassion of International Women's Day,  indian PM Narendra Modi decided to increase the share of women in engineering, technology, IITs , NITs  streams by creating supplementary seats for women and results are NITs has grown from 14.17%  to 17.53% in three years ,also IITs & Btech from 8%to 18% from 2016 to 2019.

 If we  take a look  at the reason of girls drop out in HE in rural India then we find-

1) 31.9% girls are engaged in domestic activities. 

2)  18.4%have financial weakness.

3) 15.3% are not interested in education.

4)  12.4% are get married.

Girls  enrolment  ratio which  was 103.9% in primary  education  has come down to   27.3%in  higher education.

 In view of these problems  NITI Ayog with the help of civil society organisations  started a community led programme  "Saksham Bitiya" , in 28 aspirational districts where  more than 1.87 lakh girls are trained in socio emotional and  ethical learning.  

There is a need for a socio-cultural changes where society recognises the intrinsic and instrumental values of education in the lives of women , also need for a awareness against social prejudices  and orthodox cultural norms etc. Measures such as 'Gender Inclusion Fund' and   'Special  Education Zone' (proposed by NEP 2020) for inclusion of socially and economically disadvantaged groups can be a game changer.   There is a proverb -"An educated women  educates the whole family" and we all know society makes from family not vice versa...