When it comes to engineering, Indians are the most intrigued to take up stream, and getting selected in an IIT college is almost a dream come true for most students as well as their parents. However, suddenly there has been a decline in the number of students with over 2000 students signing out of their IIT courses.
According to the data unveiled by the Ministry of Human Resource and Development (MHRD) to Rajya Sabha, 2461 students have dropped out of IIT’s. A striking percentile of 57% of students were from IIT Delhi and IIT Kharagpur. IIT Delhi with the highest number of dropouts amounting up to 782, and IIT Kharagpur following suit with 622 students. Apart from that, IIT Bombay, IIT Kanpur and IIT Madras recorded 263, 190 and 128 dropouts respectively.
The data shows a grim report, that among the dropout counts, 47.5% students which amounts up to 1171 students, fall under the Schedule Caste, Schedule Tribe and Other Backward Class category. When the question was raised by Andhra Pradesh MP V. Vijayasai Reddy, MHRD had reason to believe that the dropouts were because students were shifting to other colleges or intuitions, for personal or medical reasons, place during the ongoing courses taken or going abroad for higher educational purposes.
The MHRD also pointed out that the initial intake of students under minority categories constitutes up to 50% of the entire Student strength in a single academic year. So, if the almost the same amount of students drop out, it is nothing unusual as a student could have applied for other streams, and while pursuing IIT they could have decided to switch to other fields which involves their personal expertise. However, the uncanny decline of only minority category has raised doubt on ragging and other factors, which cannot be ruled out completely.
