IITs has abolished application fees for girls

Good news for female candidates who wish to pursue higher studies at IITs; as now IITs has abolished application fees for girls. IIT commonality will soon experience evolution in the gender asymmetry. IITs are trying to figure out the ways so that girls would be able to reach engineering colleges and the case of gender biasness will be taken care of. On 8th April, 2011 IIT-JEE body has decided to abolish application fee for girls. However, at the same time, it has decided to increase the fees for boys, from Rs. 1,000 to Rs. 1,600 for online applications and Rs. 1,800 for physical applications.

IIT Kanpur director, Sanjay Govind Dhande said that, it is a matter of concern and some serious steps should have been taken to do the needful. As there are fewer girls who take up admission in engineering; it has become necessary to hike the application fee for boys so as to meet the increasing cost of technology. IIT authorities also firmly believe that imbalance in sex ratio is not just due to conservative mindset of families; instead score for lack of appropriate infrastructure is high.

He also said that, most of the families are reluctant to send their daughters to IITs as these are residential colleges. Some students also relocate to join coaching classes and it deters a number of girls from appearing for the exam.

Moreover, the IITs have experienced slow rise of enrollment rates in the case of females in various programmes. The enrollment rate for women in 2011 has been 20%. As of now it is a matter of pride as more females are taking up postgraduate study in engineering at IITs, said K Gupta, dean of postgraduate studies, IIT.

Source: Richha Bhatnagar (Shiksha Team)
Date: 1st September, 2011