New Delhi: In a worrying trend, 2461 IIT students have dropped out from the IITs in the last two years.
According to figures shared in Parliament last week, half of all the students who dropped out were from general categories. The attrition rate was prevalent both at the B.Tech level as well at the M.Tech level.
IIT Delhi topped the list with 782 dropouts, followed by Kharagpur with 622 students and 263 from IIT Bombay. The number of students who left midway stood at 190 in IIT Kanpur and 128 in IIT Madras.
The figures have come as a big surprise for the academic fraternity, given that IIT is one of the toughest competitive exam to handle and only the very best with years of preparation and sound knowledge manage to crack it.
Reason for attrition:
News portal The Print spoke to a few IIT teachers for their views, and most of them blamed it on academic stress among other factors.
Prof Dheeraj Sanghi of IIT Delhi said the prime reason for M.Tech students to drop out is the job offers in PSUs. Such placement typically happens in July when the students have barely settled down for the new session.
“At the B.Tech level, students who drop out are mostly the ones who are not able to cope with the study pressure. Many come from Hindi medium and have difficulties adjusting,” IIT Delhi Director V Ramagopal Rao told the Print.
Caste discrimination & language:
While half the students who drop out belong to the general category, the rest are from the reserved category. Teachers whom the portal spoke to felt that caste discrimination is largely to be blamed for SC, ST and OBC students opting to drop out. Most of them come from a non-English background and therefore face a lot of difficulties in the campus.
Some years back, the HRD Ministry had recommended counselling in the classroom to cope with the stress, a suggestion which found favour with the IIT faculties. Little seems to have changed since then with the current rate of attrition.
