More women joining engineering with scholarships, affirmative action in admission, placements

NEW DELHI: Geetha C is pursuing a BE in computer science engineering at Jyothi Institute of Technology, Bengaluru, with an aim to become “financially independent”. The third-semester student wishes to support her family through a “decent job”. Fascinated by computers since childhood, she had the subject in Class 12 as well.

“I was fascinated by cartoons and animations made by programmers and coders. I wanted to understand how computers work and how coding is done,” Geetha told Careers360.

She comes from a “financially unstable” family of five members, including parents. She is the eldest among the siblings and, in future, wishes to support the education of her school-going brothers.

Geetha is the first in her extended family to study engineering. “Our relatives and neighbours discouraged me. They would tell my parents, ‘Why are you sending her to study engineering when she will be married off soon?' and ‘Many male engineering students are unemployed and what will she do after finishing the course’. However, my mother supported me and sent me to study here,” she said.

The presence of women in engineering colleges has improved, but very slowly. There are still prejudices against them. Women engineering students said they lacked peer support due to their small numbers. Students believe that the bias is due to, and also a cause of, the low participation of women in Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) courses.

However, government and private institutions are trying to address the gender gap in the field through scholarships and other means. Women engineering students also wish to be role models for school girls by securing jobs in big firms. With more companies hiring women engineers to promote inclusivity, opportunities have also improved for them.

Also read IGDTUW: All-women engineering university in Delhi planning medical, social science courses

The challenges

Divyannshi Singh, studying computer science engineering at School of Engineering (SoE) at Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), said, “The gender ratio in engineering courses here at JNU is quite bad. This results in inefficient communication with seniors as we live in different hostels and there are just a few girls in the courses.”

Acting SoE dean Ankit Chaudhary pointed out that the BTech admission is through the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) Main, followed by Joint Seat Allocation Authority (JoSAA) counselling. “Whoever qualifies, gets admission here. So, we cannot control any ratio ourselves. In the current batches, we see a 1:10 ratio of female to male students, which is better than many top engineering colleges,” he said.

Several female students also do not get support from their families or relatives.

On the condition of anonymity, a female engineering student at Delhi University’s Faculty of Technology said: “My elder brother is studying engineering at a private college in Ghaziabad. When I told my family that I wanted to study engineering after Class 12, they advised me to do a BSc (Hons) course from DU. They told me it is hard for women to make a career in engineering. However, I sat for the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) main and secured a good rank to get admission in BTech-CSE. I wish to work at Google.”

Just 13.8% of the DU engineering roll-strength is female.

Geetha said that in her village in Kalaburagi, Karnataka, girls dreaming of studying engineering were frowned upon. “They do not have any women engineering role models to look up to. They get discouraged and their families encourage male students to go for higher studies,” she said.

Debjani Mukherji, vice-president, strategic alliances, TalentSprint, a global edtech firm, said one significant barrier to women pursuing careers in engineering is the longstanding societal expectation that they prioritise caregiving responsibilities within their families, regardless of their professional success.

Scholarships, seats

Policy-makers have introduced a number of measures to improve women’s participation in engineering. With a view to improve female enrolment in the undergraduate (UG) programmes in Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT), the IIT Council introduced supernumerary seats in 2018. This took female enrolment from 8% in 2018-19 to 20% in 2020-21.

Top technical education regulator, All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), introduced Pragati scholarships in 2014 for meritorious women students. Those with family income under Rs 8 lakh per annum are eligible.

The number of scholarships under the Pragati scheme has been enhanced from 4,000 to 10,000 in 2020-21. Girl students taking admission in the second year of degree or diploma programme through lateral entry are also eligible to apply for pragati scholarships from academic year 2020-21 onwards.

AICTE member secretary Rajive Kumar said,“We have a very good enrollment of girl students in AICTE institutions. Under the Pragati scholarship scheme, we are currently paying Rs 50,000 annually. Previously the scholarship was awarded to 4,000 students; we increased it to 10,000. Afterwards, we analysed the data and found that girls’ enrollment is continuously increasing. Previously the enrollment of girls was around 30% and it is 31% now. We are not expecting it to increase immediately to 50%. It will increase gradually as the trend is positive.”

The data from AICTE website shows an increase in women enrollment at UG engineering courses since 2019-20.

AICTE Data: Women’s enrolment in BTech/BE

The experience of women students is also changing with teachers ensuring a more enabling environment.

Bartika Dutta, second-year BTech chemical engineering student at National Institute of Technology (NIT) Jalandhar, said she did not have any interest in the tech sector but decided to study chemical engineering as she is interested in petroleum and pharmacy.

“In my college, there is no issue of inequality or discrimination. Even during group projects, one girl is made part of each group. It is a good thing that colleges are encouraging girl students to study engineering,” she said.

The number of individual institutions offering scholarships is also increasing. Shiv Nadar University in Delhi-NCR announced a scholarship for meritorious female students in BTech at its School of Engineering. The scholarship, worth Rs 4 lakh, will be awarded to five female students.

“We encourage women's participation in STEM education. [The scholarship] is part of a broader initiative through which we hope to mentor and inspire women to break barriers. Our hope is to see more women in top leadership roles in STEM fields and through awards such as this one, we wish to instill this dream in our incoming students,” said Ananya Mukherjee, vice-chancellor.

Women engineers

Even in the face of opposition, women aspirants can rely on at least some family members and mentors.

In Geetha’s case, it was her mother. “My mother always supported me even though there were many problems. My mentor Mini Lakshman also provided me with the guidance and support… I would like to appeal to all girl students that they should not consider themselves inferior and not get demotivated,” she said.

Singh was inspired by her father, also a software engineer. “Engineering is a male-dominated field [but] now companies prefer to have more women employees to improve representation of females in the workforce. It is easier for us to get jobs,” she said.

Mukherji said TalentSprint is addressing the gender gap in STEM fields by providing support, resources, and opportunities for women to succeed and thrive in their careers. For the past six years, the firm has been partnering with Google in diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI).

TalentSprint launched its first Women Engineers (WE) programme in 2019 to provide advanced training to high potential women students in the first year of BTech or BE. The programme spans two years. “By focusing on students from non-IIT and non-privileged colleges, the programme aims to bridge the gap and provide opportunities for women engineers from diverse backgrounds to excel in the tech industry,” she said.

Also read Part-time BTech for working professionals is back but yet to find its audience

TalentSprint recently launched the Women in Silicon and Hardware (WISH) programme which targets women interested in hardware engineering, offering them opportunities to receive training and develop skills in the hardware industry. It is a 15-month online programme for third-year students.

“The objective is to nurture deserving women students into globally-competitive engineers, regardless of their socio-economic background. Both programmes have a 100% fee scholarship that pays the entire programme cost, while the WE programme offers a rewarding Rs 1,00,000 cash scholarship,” she said.

“WE has received over 1,30,000 applications and around 1,150 students were selected. Almost 34% of the students were first-generation graduates and over 25% of them came from rural India,” she said.