Decline in students opting for BTech courses in last 5 years: AISHE report

AISHE report reveals BTech enrolment has fallen from 40.85 lakh in 2016-17 to 36.63 lakh in 2020-21, even as overall admission numbers have increased in other programmes at undergraduate level. 

According to the latest report released by the All India Higher Education Survey (AISHE), the number of students opting for BTech programmes has declined in the past five years even as overall admission numbers have increased in other programmes at the undergraduate level. BTech enrolment has fallen from 40.85 lakh in 2016-17 to 36.63 lakh in 2020-21, the report said.  

The report stated that enrolment in various programmes at undergraduate level has increased over the years in regular mode of education except in BTech.  

Year-wise student enrolment in engg courses at UG level in regular mode of education  

Year	Number of students opted for BTech courses
2016-17	4085321
2017-18	3940080
2018-19	3770949
2019-20	3644045
2020-21	3663685

Female participation still low in engg courses 

Female participation remained very low in engineering courses at undergraduate and postgraduate level in regular mode of education, the report revealed. University Grants Commission (UGC) chairperson M Jagadesh Kumar said the trend is the same globally. “Even in countries such as the UK and the US, women constitute less than 20 per cent of engineering education and profession. In India, what is gladdening is that more female students are getting into professional programmes each year," he said.

Female per 100 male students in engineering programmes in regular mode of education

Year	BTech	MTech
2016-17	39	67
2017-18	38	55
2018-19	40	54
2019-20	42	63
2020-21	40	47

Top 10 substreams of engineering and technology as per enrolment 

Overall in undergraduate, postgraduate, MPhil and PhD, the total enrolment is 36,86,291 (71 per cent males and 29 per cent females). Of these, the highest enrolment is in computer engineering followed by mechanical engineering, electronics engineering, civil engineering, electrical engineering. Similar trend follows in undergraduate and PhD also. However, at postgraduate level, highest enrolment is in civil engineering (36,312) in which male contribution is 71.8 per cent followed by computer engineering (29,333) in which male contribution is 48 per cent. 

In 2018, the IIT admissions council decided to introduce supernumerary seats for female students with the addition of 800 (14 per cent) seats across 23 IITs in 2018 while the number stood at 946 (17 per cent) female-only seats across IITs in 2019. The aim was to ensure that female enrolment reaches a target of at least 20 per cent of the undergraduate class by 2020.

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