Newer IIMs Stay Low on Gender Balance

Most of the newer Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) have a long distance to cover before they can catch up with their older counterparts on gender diversity. The percentage of women in the 2013-15 batch at four IIMs in Tiruchirapalli, Ranchi, Shillong and Udaipur, has dropped – in some cases sharply. Only three of the seven new IIMs – Rohtak, Raipur and Kashipur – have managed to surpass last year’s numbers. The six older IIMs have all outdone last year’s performance (ET, June 17).

At IIM-Shillong, which is in its sixth year, the percentage of women has fallen to 22% this year from nearly 30% of the batch last time. IIM-Ranchi has seen the numbers drop to 8.75% this year from 18% in the 2012-14 batch and IIM-Udaipur, to 13.6% in the 2013-15 batch from 28% last time. The sharpest fall has been in the case of IIM-Trichy, where, at 52.9%, more than half the class of 2012-14 comprised women. This year, it’s a mere 15.7%.

With the exception of IIM-Shillong and IIM-Ranchi, all the new IIMs awarded extra points to women in the interest of gender diversity. It worked in some cases, like that of IIM-Raipur or IIM-Rohtak, where the institute has seen the percentage of women jump nearly five-fold to 47.6% from 9.6%.

“There is a feeling in the government as well as corporates that increased representation of women is the need of the hour. That’s true of educational institutes as well,” says IIM-Rohtak Director P. Rameshan. The institute gave women students extra points for gender diversity at the time of shortlisting.

IIM-Trichy, on its part, gave one percentage point extra to women candidates, marginally lower than what was given last year. But Godwin Tennyson, Chairperson, Placement and External Relations, IIM-Trichy says that cannot be the only reason for the higher proportion of women last year.

“The percentage of women admitted in an IIM has many drivers starting from the percentage of women who cleared CAT and qualified for the admission selection process. A candidate gets admitted based on about seven dimensions: written analysis test, personal interview, work experience, performance at undergraduate level, masters degree or professional qualification, gender and CAT score,” says Tennyson. “So, the chance of someone getting admitted to an IIM is a complex function with many moving parts. We cannot filter out a single dimension that really contributed to the admission of a student,” he adds.

IIM-Shillong, on its part, says it has always focused on meritocracy and diversity of the participants, and not on gender diversity for their PGDM course. Diversity is not about one programme alone, says MJ Xavier, Director of IIM-Ranchi. So while the institute’s PGDM programme has seen a fall in the number of women, their PGDHRM programme has a much higher proportion of women – nearly 37%, or 16 out of 43 students.

“Between the various programmes including FPM, we have around 20% women on campus. Without giving marks for gender diversity, we have still managed to attract a lot of women,” says Xavier. “However, since most people are giving extra marks for women, I may be forced to do that from next year,” he added.

Added the IIM-Ranchi Director: “We are trying to achieve diversity across many dimensions such as educational background, work experience, masters degree and gender. Overall, all these dimensions contribute to the learning experience in the class. At the same time, we also try to ensure that quality of the batch is not compromised for diversity.”

With corporates trying to shore up their gender diversity numbers and IIMs serving as one of the most critical pipelines of managerial talent, there’s a buzz across campuses about getting more women on board. Already, there have been changes made in the pattern of CAT: 50% weightage to language skills as well as a written test during the admission process, both designed to get more women.

The number of women applicants in CAT has also seen an increase to 60,876 in 2012, which represents 28.4% of total applicants compared with 27.3% in CAT 2011.

Debashis Chatterjee, Director of IIM-Kozhikode, which at 54.29%, has the highest number of women across all IIMs, says the institute was responding to market demands for diversity. For the past 40 to 50 years, 8% to 10% was the average composition of women in IIM classes, he says, adding: “That was lopsided, the diversity skewed in terms of gender. Now it’s not only about correcting the balance, but also about creating the necessary aspirations among women.”

Global B-schools, he says, now decide diversity profiles before they admit students. “Once diversity is made a consideration, more women apply. IIMs don’t have to give points to women. They just have to change their lens,” says Chatterjee.

Source: The Economic Times, July 5, 2013

Gender parity rules in top B-schools

The top three IIMs (Indian Institutes of Management) have announced that they are increasing the intake of women students this year, but gender diversity is something other top-rung B-schools can boast of having had since much earlier.

Business schools such as the Indian School of Business (ISB), and Chennai’s Great Lakes Institute of Management (GLIM) are not in the high league of the IIMs, but from their initial years these institutes have taken in a higher proportion of women students. Delhi University’s Faculty of Management Studies (FMS) and XLRI, Jamshedpur have also experienced this diversity for a few years now.

Over the years, these B-schools have contributed powerful women business leaders to the world including Leena Nair, Global Senior Vice-President for leadership and organisation development at Unilever. 43-year-old Nair is an XLRI alumna, from the 1992 batch. FMS also boasts of popular alumnae. Neelam Dhawan, Managing Director of HP India, is one of them.

At ISB, women account for 25 per cent of the current batch. In 2013 it was 28 per cent. ISB has maintained the percentage of women students at 26-29 per cent for the past few years. “We encourage more women to apply to our full-time management programme during the admissions information sessions,” says V. K. Menon, Senior Director of Careers, Admissions and Financial Aid at ISB. He adds that the institute doesn’t have any special criteria for women and that there is a stringent and bias-free admissions process.

GLIM says gender diversity is important and the institute constantly strives to take more female students every year by making slight changes in the weightage. Though it refuses to divulge details, it says all factors being equal, girls are to be given preference. The percentage of women in GLIM’s PGPM batch has dropped from 33 per cent last year to 25 per cent this year.

At FMS, the number of women in the 2013 batch was 53 out of 215. The number fell to 41 out of 219 students in 2014. The 2015 batch, however, can see an increase in the number of girls once again. The records show that the number of women admitted to business schools other than IIMs is not low the past few years. According to Madhu Vij, a senior faculty at FMS Delhi, the majority of CAT-top-percentile holders are male students and this could be the reason for fewer girls entering the IIMs.

Family pressures
Ravneet Bawa, an ISB student, who has almost 12 years of experience in the IT industry, and who stays on the school’s Mohali campus with her one-year-old child, has a different take on the issue. “Women, after a while, tend to divert attention from their careers owing to family commitments,” says Bawa, who also heads ISB’s Women in Business initiative. “With the help of our alumni, we at ISB are trying to create a support system that allows women to get through the difficult times when they can keep that great job and climb up the leadership ladder,” she adds.

The alumnae of the new Gurgaon-based School of Inspired Leadership endorse this view. “Soon after a career of three-and-a-half years, I realised my core strength was management and decided to write the GMAT,” says Suchita, who is now working as consultant with TCS, Chennai. “In most cases a woman’s career goes for a toss after she gets involved in her married life and kids, and I wanted to complete my post-graduation well before getting married.”

About 38 per cent of the current batch in this school comprises women. Last year they made up 30 per cent. The much-older XLRI Jamshedpur has maintained a better percentage of women over the years. The 2014 batch of XLRI’s PGDBM batch has around 16 per cent of women students but for the HR course it’s higher at 39 per cent

Source: The Hindu Business Line, June 25, 2013

In a first, girls among IIT entrance test toppers

If Sibbala Leena Madhuri is aware of having made history, she’s not showing it. The 16 year-old, originally from Thirupathi and now based in Hyderbad, is one of the first two girls ever to feature in the top 10 ranks of the entrance exam to the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs). Her rank is eighth; the other girl, Aditi Laddha from Ratlam, Madhya Pradesh (Delhi zone),is sixth.

“I thought I would get below rank 20, wasn’t expecting my score to be in the top 10,” says Leena. With a score of 97.9% — Andhra Pradesh board – she assumes she’s in the top 20 percentile. “I think I’ll go to Mumbai or Delhi IIT and will opt for either electronics or computer science.” When she’s not studying, she plays chess and listens to music. Only about 11% of the total number qualifying are women.

Pallerla Sai Sandeep Reddy, 17, Harry Potter-fan and JEE Advanced topper, wants computer science at Mumbai IIT too. But that’s for a start. “Finally I’ll take up robotics,” he says on his way to “college” (high school in Hyderabad) to celebrate. “I didn’t think I’d top before the exam but after, yes,” he says laughing. His exam went that well. Son of a government school teacher of social studies, Sandeep has spent many years away from home in a village near Podili town, Prakasham district, AP. He was staying in hostel in Hyderabad and had completed the entire high-school syllabus by the middle of Class 11. “That way I could devote the next year to preparation. I studied 12 hours,” he says.

The IITs surprised everyone by declaring the results two days before the scheduled June 23. “The reason we are doing this early is because there are many applicants from very remote parts of the country who don’t have internet access and, therefore, don’t get to know their results in time for counseling,” says IIT-Delhi Director, R.K. Shevgaonkar. The IITs will be sending hardcopies of results to the candidates so that those without internet access are not left out. Counseling will start from June 24 and continue till June 30. The physical verification of certificates for the first round of counseling will be done between July 4 and 8.

Of the 152,351 candidates who cleared JEE Mains and were eligible for JEE Advanced, 126,704 registered and even less actually appeared. “One of the reasons for this,” says IIT Delhi’s organizing chairman, H C Gupta, “Is that several states, for instance Gujarat, didn’t conduct state exams and admitted on the basis of JEE Main (held in April) result. Many students who didn’t register or write exam would’ve got into state engineering colleges. Next year, many states have opted for JEE Main including West Bengal, Maharashtra and Haryana.” He further adds that many of the applicants who didn’t write the exam even after registering would be girls – registration for them was free, they registered then didn’t show.

The IITs are calling for counseling 276 SC/ST candidates who will be placed in the one-year “preparatory” course – reintroduced this year – and placed in first year from the next session. This is the first time the entrance exam into the IITs has been conducted in two parts. “For the first time we have to do the pre-preparation for the number of centres for the tests all on the basis of assumptions,” says Gupta. The number of seats has increased at the IITs from 9,647 to 9,885 but the maximum increase has happened at the newer IITs where new courses have been launched.

Source: The Times of India, June 22, 2013

IIMs get a fair deal with higher intake of women in 2013-15 batch

Women power just got its biggest shot in the arm across campuses of IIMs (Indian Institutes of Management) this year with the institutes’ efforts to increase their intake of female students yielding significant dividends. Data from the five IIMs at Calcutta, Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Lucknow and Indore shows that the institutes are set to welcome a record number of women in the 2013-15 batch. With the exception of IIM-Ahmedabad, which has acceptances from 80 women, the other four will all have more than a hundred women each on their rolls.

Says Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Chairman and Managing Director of Biocon: “The intake of more women in IIMs will certainly have a positive impact on gender diversity and on building women in leadership roles in corporate India. I do believe that business schools should ensure a minimum percentage of women enrolments and in that context affirmative enrolments are desirable.”

The top three IIMs — Ahmedabad, Bangalore and Calcutta — alone have received a total of 294 acceptances or confirmations from women students so far, as compared to 215 for the 2012-14 batch. The total batch size across these three IIMs, based on acceptances till now, has risen from 1,220 to 1,247 this year, which means that women students comprise around 23.6% of the batch across the top three IIMs this year, compared to 17.6% in the 2012-14 batch.

The acceptance of offers to the IIMs’ flagship PGP programme is still ongoing and there may be additions and/or withdrawals till June 17, 2013, at the top three and end-June-early-July for the rest. But all data points to the fact that the final tally of women will easily surpass that of last year.

IIM-Calcutta, which trailed behind the other IIMs till last year on the women students’ count, has got its act together this time. By awarding three points out of 100 to female candidates at the shortlisting stage, it has seen women students surge ahead, doubling from 11% (51) of the 462-strong batch last year to 23% (107) this time around. For 2011-13, it was a mere 31.

“Companies are increasingly looking for more women professionals. That apart, women students tend to bring a greater balance and diversity to the classroom in terms of approach and ideas. Giving extra weightage to them was part of the affirmative action IIM Calcutta decided to take,” said Prof Sanjeet Singh, Chairperson-Admissions, IIM-C.

Top MBA programmes are usually among the most critical pipelines for future business leaders. Debjani Ghosh, MD – Sales and Marketing, Intel South Asia, see the positives in such initiatives. “Unleashing the power of women in India in corporations, politics and government is a must do. If this great country of ours wants to be seen for whatever it’s really worth. And yes, higher education institutes like IIMs need to do their bit to prepare women for the corporate world,” she says. She adds: “They must increase their own intake of women and also focus on building the needed level of confidence in the women students. Everybody needs to do their bit to ensure we build a strong workforce for India. Our success depends on it.”

The IIMs are certainly doing their share. At IIM-Indore, the number of acceptances from women so far has gone up from 74 out of 453 last year to 126 out of 445 acceptances till now. Six acceptances are still pending but so far the percentage of women stands at 28.3% as opposed to 16.3% of the 453-strong batch of 2013-14.

“It’s a welcome development. What’s more, it has happened without awarding any special marks to women,” said Rohit Kapoor, Admissions Chairperson at IIM-Indore. Ashutosh Sinha, his counterpart at IIM-Lucknow, says that out of 397 confirmations that the institute has received so far, 154 are women. Last year’s tally was 162 women out of 450. “But with 53 acceptances yet to come, we are expecting the final tally of women to rise anywhere between 160-170,” says Sinha.

Source: The Economic Times (Online Edition), June 17, 2013

GMAT Council plans to attract more aspirants

The Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC), which conducts the Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT), wants to increase its base of test takers in India by attracting undergraduate students to appear for the examination. Traditionally, GMAT, a standardised test to help business schools select qualified applicants, has been popular with candidates with more than four years of work experience, and undergraduates have largely kept away from taking GMAT.

“Undergraduates typically do not write the GMAT in large numbers. If they write the exam, they do so for banking the score—which is valid for five years. We are trying to inform them they can go for a masters programme right after graduation. We are trying to broaden the perspective of the audience, and thus working with undergraduates,” said Ashish Bhardwaj, Regional Director, South Asia, GMAC.

Bhardwaj says over the last decade, most of the top business schools internationally have launched masters programme in various streams, including management, accounting, financial accounting, telecom management, health care, hospitality, etc. This one year masters programme prepares one for a functional job.

“This particular set up of offering enjoys a very limited awareness in India. Therefore, we think we can make more information flow to candidates and inform their choices by telling them that they can straight away go for a masters programme after graduation,” says Bhardwaj.

GMAC has so far worked with around 16 undergraduate colleges, and the council says the response has been good. Another focus area for the council, says Bhardwaj, is to get more women candidates to take GMAT. In India, only 26 per cent GMAT takers are women, whereas in China, it is 58 per cent. GMAC wishes to take the number of Indian woman test takers to around 40 per cent in the next five years.

“We think women are very important. We are struggling to find out how to get more women in India to take GMAT. We are looking at ways on how to reach out to women. One way is to go to women only undergraduate college,” says Bhardwaj.

With nearly 80 per cent of Indians preferring an MBA education, an important test taker group for GMAC are candidates from the non-traditional undergraduate background, like lawyers, doctors, ex-defence officers, etc. The council says it is looking at ways to create more diversity in a class. “Not just business schools, but recruiters too want more diversity,” says Bhardwaj.

After the US and China, India is the third biggest market for GMAT. The council says it sees the most dramatic growth for itself in the Asian region. “Asia is clearly going to be a growth area for us in the near future. Given the demographic dividend in the region and the growth of management education, we see the growth continuing for us,” added Bhardwaj.

GMAT exam volume for the 2012 testing year (July 1, 2011, to June 30, 2012), was up 11 per cent from the previous year. This was also eight per cent higher than the previous record of 265,613 in 2009.

Chinese test takers, the second-largest citizenship group after the US, represented 20 per cent of global testing. In 2012, the number of exams taken by Chinese citizens increased 45 per cent to 58,196 exams. Indian citizens, the third-largest citizenship group, took 30,213 GMAT exams, a figure that increased 19 per cent in 2012.

GMAC’s India office looks at the SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) market. Within this area, India alone is 96 per cent of the market. “So, it’s needless to say our time will go in developing the India market,” says Bhardwaj. Around 175 programmes in India accept GMAT. The Council is focusing only on top 200 business schools in India.

With an investment of over $4 million in the India market so far, the Council is also looking at opening a few more new test centres in the country.

Source: Business Standard, October 4, 2012

256% rise in Indian students going abroad in 10 years: IIM-B Study

Campuses in the West have for long been wooing young Indians, with education fairs, road shows and special admission campaigns nudging thousands to pick up brochures that give a peek into college life in Europe. While studying in Oxbridge still remains the highest academic aspiration among the youth here, between 2000 and 2009, the number of Indian students in foreign countries has grown by 256% or three-and-a-half times.

Going by the findings of a study conducted by the Indian Institute of Management-Bangalore (IIM-B), the profile of the internationally mobile Indian students is changing. Traditionally, north Indians flocked to Europe for higher education, but increasingly, students from Gujarat as well as the southern states are making a beeline for institutes in those countries, with one in every two Indians studying in the UK being a woman. And when it comes to scholarships and grants, most of them are bagged by students from southern India, shows the study, “Indian student mobility to selected European countries: An Overview”.

The paper is part of a research project financed by the European Union (EU) and carried out by Rupa Chanda and Shahana Mukherjee at IIM-B, researchers at the European University Institute, Indian Council of Overseas Employment, and Maastricht University (Faculty of Law). One-year Master’s programmes in business and management have been the most popular field, but many engineering and mathematics and computer science aspirants also head for Europe. “But healthcare, English and linguistics are not gaining popularity,” notes the study.

According to the study, there has been a steady annual rise of 7% Indians travelling overseas for a degree. More than 53,000 Indians went abroad in 2000 and at the end of the decade, the count shot up to 190,000. While the US has been steady in the top slot of having most number of Indian students, education magnet UK has been a close second. However, the interest in the US seems to have slipped, albeit slightly, as other countries like Australia hard sell their universities. The US’s loss also seems to be adding up to Europe’s gain. Across the globe, the UK attracts the second largest contingent of international students and since 2009, about 17% Indian students have been visiting there annually; after all, Indians comprise the second largest group of international students in the UK.

Between 2000 and 2009, the count of Indian students in Europe has increased from 3,348 to 51,556, with the UK separately logging a rise from 3,962 to 36,105. But across Europe, Germany and France get most of remaining Indian students. “Indian students are now also exploring other countries such as Sweden, Italy and Ireland, where education is considerably cheaper and part-time jobs are easier to secure,” said the researchers.

Source: The Times of India, September 9, 2012

Few girls in IITs, more in other engineering courses

The Kota coaching factor still plays a key role in the IITs admission process, girls still opt less for these 15 institutes than for engineering courses elsewhere, and state school boards send the most students to IITs (Indian Institutes of Technology), according to an analysis of the patterns in the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) results of 2012.

The analysis, presented today at the meeting of the Joint Admission Board, found that girls comprise a mere 10 per cent of admissions to the 15 IITs after cracking JEE but 30-40 per cent in other engineering institutes, including several prestigious ones. An IIT professor says the coaching industry is a key factor in the current JEE system; most parents prefer not to send their daughters to coaching classes at far flung Kota or Hyderabad.

The analysis, conducted by the IITs, also examined the general student profile and found it is once again the middle class and urban India that dominates JEE. Jaipur and Hyderabad top the list with their dominant coaching culture, followed by Delhi; Kanpur, Lucknow and Allahabad too are in the top 10 cities sending students to IITs.

Of students who cracked JEE, 40 per cent students came from the CBSE; of those who reached the IITs, 50 per cent come from state boards. The ICSE and other school boards had poor representation. Prof. S G Dhande, Director of IIT Kanpur, says the analysis only reinforces the need to reinvent the JEE.

“It is clear that coaching is a very real factor giving students an extra edge at clearing JEE. That fewer girls make it is also linked to this factor. The analysis only draws attention to the urgent need to make this examination a more dynamic and responsive system that is modern rather than orthodox,” Prof. Dhande told The Indian Express. For 2013, the top 150,000 from JEE Main will be eligible for JEE Advanced.

Source: The Indian Express, August 28, 2012

IIT entrance exam sees ‘she change’ – 11% increase in female candidates

Woman power is evident in the Indian Institute of Technology’s Joint Entrance Examination (IIT-JEE), too. The IIT-JEE, to be held tomorrow, has seen an 11 per cent increase in the number of girls applying — the highest so far — whereas, boys have seen a mere three per cent rise. The number of students appearing for the exam has also seen a sharp increase. About 530,000 students will take probably the last IIT-JEE, compared to 480,000 students who took the exam last year.

The Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) is planning to introduce a single entrance examination for admission to the IITs from 2013. In the admission process, the class 12 board exam score may also get weightage. This year, candidates will be competing for about 9,600 seats in 15 IITs across the country, the Institute of Technology at Benaras Hindu University and the Indian School of Mines at Dhanbad.

Pramod Maheshwari, founder and CEO, Career Point Info Systems, said in the last three years he had seen a shift in the subjects girl students had been choosing. “After internal research, we found that girl students are increasingly opting for mathematics. Earlier, biology was largely opted by girls. Our research and interaction with parents revealed that because the medical profession has a longer pay-back period than engineering, the number of girls applying to IITs over a period of time has been increasing. Besides, the outlook of parents has also changed towards engineering as a profession,” said Maheshwari.

“There has been a 15 per cent rise year-on-year in the number of girls taking the exam in Mumbai. We attribute it to the fact that other courses such as medical have a longer duration and involve higher expenses,” said Chandan Dikshit, marketing head at Rao IIT Academy. He added that since software was one of the favourite professions among girl students, they opted for engineering. “IT companies would want an engineer in their company, rather than a science graduate or a degree holder from other fields,” said Dikshit. About 11,000 plus students will be taking the exam from Rao IIT Academy this year.

Manoj Sharma, vice-president (operations and business development), Resonance, explained the opportunity to get into soft courses like mathematical computing, biomedical engineering and biotechnology at the IITs prompted more girl students to apply. “Waiving of the fee for online IIT-JEE applications for girl students and an offline fee of Rs. 200 for them compared to Rs. 1,800 for boys is also a major boost,” said Sharma.

IIT heads also feel the increase in the number of girl students is most likely because of the free registration. “I do hope this would motivate more girls to apply, which may in turn translate into more female students at the IITs,” said Gautam Barua, Director, IIT-Guwahati.

Officials of coaching institutes also said there was only a marginal increase (around three per cent) in the number of boys applying for the examination. “The number of girls who have applied went up from 22 per cent last year to 33 per cent this year,” according to Sharma of Resonance.

Source: Business Standard, April 8, 2012

UGC mulls 20 exclusive universities, 800 colleges for women

Espousing the cause of women’s education, the 12th Five Year Plan period document of the University Grants Commission (UGC) has proposed 20 exclusive universities for them and 800 constituent colleges under the central varsities to ensure equity in access to quality education. The UGC has also sought a four-time hike in allocation during the Five-Year Plan period from Rs. 46,632 crore (Rs. 466.32 billion) to Rs. 184,740 crore (Rs. 1.8474 trillion) to achieve its proposed initiatives.

The initiatives also include upgrading of autonomous colleges with potential of excellence, enhancing intake capacity of institutes of higher education and development of ‘college cluster universities’. The plan document broadly emphasis on achieving the triple objectives of access and expansion, equity and inclusion, and quality and excellence, with an emphasis on consolidation and optimal use of infrastructure already created during the 11th Plan period.

Giving thrust to women’s education, the plan document has proposed 20 universities facilitating their entry into higher education even from traditional background and rural and sub-urban areas. The Centre has proposed to fund their establishment while the state governments may provide the land and help to establish such universities, the document states while holding the idea was included “because the social dynamics of our system”. Stating that certain sectors of our population are still not open to send girls to coeducational institutions, the UGC document contends that exclusive institutes of higher education in some pockets for women “may act as a fillip to the participation of girls in higher education”.

In addition to the already proposed and partially implemented 374 model colleges scheme, a new scheme of constituent colleges has been proposed for the 40 central universities in the country. Under the scheme, 20 colleges each will be set up in the respective states in the district headquarters, numbering to 800 new colleges in all. This will balance the regional distribution of colleges based on population density of the youth in the age group of 18-23 years. “The colleges should be of international configuration in infrastructure, hostels, playground, library and technology-savvy classrooms, and to be 100% funded by the Centre as is presently followed in the case of the Delhi University,” it said.

Source: The Times of India, January 27, 2012

Delhi to have an exclusive tech varsity for women

Delhi will soon have a technical university exclusively for women. Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit on Monday said the existing technical college — Indira Gandhi Institute of Technology, currently a part of Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University (GGSIP) — would soon be upgraded into a full-fledged university.

The Delhi Cabinet on Monday approved the draft of Indira Gandhi Delhi Technical University Bill, 2012, which will now be placed in the Assembly’s budget session. “The Indira Gandhi Institute has attained a level of maturity and has made rich contribution to the growth of quality technical education and research among women during last 12 years. Since 85% seats in the institute are reserved for Delhi girls, it has also given them better placement and career opportunities.

“We now want to upgrade it to meet the growing needs of the industry for relevant technology and product innovation,” Dikshit told reporters. Dikshit said Delhi would be the first state to have an exclusive technical university for women. “It will also facilitate additional enrolment of women in technological courses as parents are often reluctant to send their daughters outside Delhi for higher education. We expect that student strength will increase to almost two times the current strength in the next few years,” Dikshit said.

A senior technical education official said the upgrade of the institute would provide an opportunity for accelerated growth of women in technical education, technology incubation and product innovation vital for women empowerment.

Source: Hindustan Times, January 17, 2012