More Women Than Men Have Enrolled in Higher Education in Last 8 Years: AISHE Report

According to the recently released All India Survey on Higher Education (AISHE) for the year 2021-22, more women than men have enrolled in higher education in the last eight years. Women account for 55 per cent of the total increase in total enrollment in higher education (91 lakh) since 2014-15. According to the latest survey report, out of the total enrollment of 4.33 crore, 48 per cent or 2.07 crore are women. A small rise of 2.01 crore was observed in female enrolment from 1.88 crore in 2019-20. In 2014-15, out of a total 3.42 crore enrollments, the percentage of women was 46 per cent.

There has been a continuous increase in the enrollment of women since the year 2014-15, the AISHE report stated. Enrollment of women increased by 18.7 per cent during five years, from 2.01 crore in 2020-21 and from 1.74 crore in 2017-18 to 2.07 crore in 2021-22. The report released said, “The share of female enrollment in the increase in total enrollment (91 lakh) since 2014-15 is 55 per cent. There has been more increase in the enrollment of women as compared to men.”

Overall, this trend indicates a narrowing gender gap in higher education. Among the areas where women have made their mark is the science stream, in which 52.1 per cent of the total 57.18 lakh students enrolled at the undergraduate, postgraduate, MPhil, and PhD levels are women. About 51 per cent of the total enrolled at the undergraduate level are women in the science stream. In the year 2020-21, as many as 55.48 lakh students took admission to Science, of which 53.1 per cent were women, showing a slight decline.

At the PG level in Science, 61.2 per cent of the 7.52 lakh students enrolled are women. Of the 45,324 students enrolled in PhD programmes in the sciences, more than half (62 per cent) are women, while only 39 per cent are men. The latest AISHE survey showed that the annual growth in female PhD enrollment from 2014-15 to 2021-22 is 10.4 per cent. However, the difference between engineering and technology disciplines is clear. Of the total students enrolled in undergraduate programmes, only 11.3 lakh are females and 27.6 lakh are males.