Higher studies and the marginalised | Poor representation of SCs, STs in Ph.D programmes at IIT Madras

Students from the Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) communities have considerably poor representation and acceptance price in Ph.D programmes at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)Madras, evaluation of knowledge obtained via the Right to Information (RTI) Act revealed.

The evaluation was based mostly on knowledge offered by IIT Madras concerning 2,195 admissions created from 54,462 candidates in the five-year interval from 2015 to 2019.

The knowledge confirmed that SC college students numbered solely 7.6% and STs have been simply 1.2%. The reservation coverage requires that 15% of seats be allotted to SCs and 7.5% to STs.

Moreover, the knowledge confirmed a major distinction in the acceptance price, which refers to the quantity of college students admitted for each 100 candidates. While General Category (GC) college students, which in the case of the IITs predominantly refers to these from traditionally privileged communities, had an acceptance price of 4.4%, it was 2.9% for SCs and 2.7% for STs.

Only 167 of the 5,855 SC candidates and 27 of the 991 ST candidates have been chosen.

Interestingly, the establishment had stuffed the reservation-mandated seats for Other Backward Classes (OBCs), due to 9 of the 16 departments that managed to fill the seats. . 29.8% of the seats went to OBC candidates towards the 27% of minimal allocation to be accomplished as per reservation norms. The remaining 61.6% seats went to the GC class.

Though IIT Madras had admitted 3,874 Ph.D. students from 2015 to 2019 in keeping with the knowledge submitted by the Ministry of Education in the Parliament final 12 months, it offered community-wise knowledge on functions and admissions for less than 2,195 admissions (57% of the complete).

Despite appeals via RTI, a number of of the 16 analysis departments in IIT Madras didn’t give knowledge for some semesters. For the Mathematics Department, the administration stated it had knowledge for just one semester.

It will be famous, nevertheless, that the RTI knowledge adopted a reasonably related sample to that of the knowledge submitted to the Parliament in phrases of seat allocation. Of the 3,874 admissions, 64.4% went to the GCs, 27.9% to OBCs, and solely 6.4% to SCs and 1.3% to STs.

The RTI knowledge threw gentle on how the distinction in acceptance price was extra pronounced in some departments.

For occasion, in Aerospace Engineering (AE), the acceptance price was 6.6% for GCs and just one.7% for SCs. In absolute numbers, solely 5 of the 292 SC candidates have been chosen. In distinction, 100 candidates have been chosen from the 1,520 GC candidates.

A stark distinction in acceptance price was additionally noticed in Applied Mechanics, Electrical Engineering, Humanities and Social Sciences, and Management Studies, between GC and SC candidates.

The Department of Computer Science and Engineering had one of the highest quantity of candidates from SC and ST classes. From the 755 SC candidates, solely 4 have been chosen and from 136 ST candidates, none have been chosen. While the total acceptance price was decrease in the division, it was decrease nonetheless for SC and ST candidates.

Engineering Design and Mechanical Engineering have been amongst the exceptions, with related acceptance charges for all classes. While most departments had poor acceptance charges for STs, departments like Physics, Metallurgical and Materials Engineering, and Ocean Engineering, had higher acceptance charges for SCs. Consequently, they got here nearer to filling seats as per the reservation guidelines.

Ruling out the chance that the distinction in acceptance price was as a result of choice bias, Bhaskar Ramamurthi, Director, IIT Madras, stated that the establishment in reality adopted a method of calling a excessive share of SC and ST candidates for interview.

He stated that an inside evaluation of the previous three years of knowledge confirmed that SC and ST candidates have been roughly 10% and 1.7% of the complete candidates to the establishment. He stated that whereas 32% of candidates have been known as for an interview total, the price was 65% for SC and ST candidates.

“Only 25 to 30% of those from SC/ST categories who are called attended the interview,” he stated. While the share chosen amongst these interviewed was 24% total, it was 16% for the reserved classes. “The acceptance rate for SC/ST is therefore not lower given that the calling rate is double,” he stated.

On how the establishment stuffed the seats reserved for OBC with the acceptance price being higher, he stated, “We do not know why, but are happy that this is so.”

(This is the second of a 3-part sequence)