Latest data on trends among the girl students at school level in terms of career choices have thrown some interesting results. The numbers of girls in the higher secondary willing to opt for sciences stream starting plus-two has more than doubled across states in India.

While researchers are still poring over the factors that have led to such change, the education planners and policy makers need to seize the opportunity for smooth transition of such female students through the STEM pipeline, ensuring that eventually leads to getting the right job.

Southern states such as Karnataka, which traditionally had advantage over the North in terms of higher education institutions and facilities, also showed surprising surge in girls willing to enroll in science stream

In the North states such as Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh nearly doubled the numbers in this duration. Haryana almost came close to tripling the enrolment from 583 in 2022 to 1580 in 2024.

However, the Centre government and state government will have to raise infrastructure and ecosystem which is conducive to absorbing college and university female pass outs into technical jobs. To maintain the work-life balance, the allocated jobs should such which can be undertaken in the event of location change because of marriage or any other reason. In this respect the states will need to shed their bureaucratic barriers that might stop one from getting a job after transfer to other state.

The Department of Science and Technology (DST) says it is implementing Vigyan Jyoti programme to encourage meritorious girls to pursue higher education and careers in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) fields since 2019-20. The programme aims to promote gender parity in STEM by sustaining the talent pool in science and technology through various year-round activities like hands-on experiential learning sessions, interactions with scientific role models, visits to R&D and industrial labs, career guidance workshops and student-parent counseling sessions that provide exposure to increase the interest and inclination of girls towards science.

Till now, Vigyan Jyoti programme has benefitted over 80,000 high-achieving girls from 300 districts across 35 States/UTs. To strengthen its impact, the DST has engaged with over 250 premier national institutions, including universities, science and technology institutes, CSIR labs, and other reputed organizations, which serve as knowledge partners, contributing significantly to the program’s mission of fostering more girl’s participation in STEM.

Data of All India Survey on Higher Education 2020-21 shows, approximately 43% of the students enrolled in science streams in Class 11 and 12 are girls. This is up from 40% in 2010 which is just marginal. Boys tend to dominate in subjects like mathematics and physics which is 60-70% of the students.

At college level, girls represent around 35-40% of the total enrolment in STEM courses compared to boys who make up for 60-65%. Approximately 70-75% of girls who pursue science in school, continue with it in college, and boys make up for s80-85%.

Over the past two decades since 2001, girls constituted around 30% of STEM graduates, which has now increased to 40%. This increase is partly due to policy interventions, scholarship programs, and growing awareness about gender equality in education.  A significant percentage of girls who take up science in higher secondary education continue with it at the college level. However, the dropout rate is higher for girls compared to boys, largely due to socio-cultural factors, financial constraints, and early marriage.

It is at this critical point, moving from school to college, the Government needs to intervene and arrest the fall in STEM continuity among the girls. The flow in the talent pipeline must not drop, which is required to refurbish and maintain the expertise pool of women in top tech jobs.

Allied to quantum science, the quantum computing, IT and cybersecurity are other areas where women are performing but lagging in numbers. According to a 2023 report by NASSCOM, women constitute about 35% of the Indian tech workforce, yet only 11% hold C-suite positions. In streams like software development and IT services, women make up about 30% of the workforce, but in fields like cybersecurity and hardware, their representation drops to just 10% and 8%, respectively.

This gender gap has persisted despite various policy interventions aimed at promoting women in STEM. The National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, for example, has placed a strong emphasis on improving access to quality STEM education for girls. By integrating vocational education, coding, and computational thinking from middle school, the policy aims to spark interest in technology among young girls and encourage them to pursue careers in this field. Moreover, the policy calls for creation of gender-inclusive learning environments and training teachers to eliminate biases in the classroom.