Scenario of Higher Education of Women in India

Singh, Jaya
Jaya Singh, an alumnus of Banaras Hindu University, presently a research scholar in department of Agriculture Extension, Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi. She has published peer reviewed 2 research/review papers and 1 book chapter. She has also won many awards.

India's higher education system is the world's third largest in terms of students, next to China and the United States. In future, India will be one of the largest education hubs. The literacy rate of women and male are 65.4 & 82.14% respectively that clearly shows the situation of a women who not only faces so many barriers like gender stereotype, gender biasedness & segregation but also illiteracy and ignorance of parents, early marriage and lack of adequate facilities for safety & hygiene. Women empowerment is synonymous with the educated women. The Indian government has taken so many steps to improve the educational status of the women with their significant inclusion & representation in decision making. However, the Government of India frames different policies and programme at different levels cover various proportions and strategies of gender development. Efforts have been made to empower women in a social, economical and political context over the years but due to lack of synchronization and coordination, the achievements are not satisfactory. India still has to do a lot to make it practically true to remove an illusion of reality.