Zero transgender enrolment for IGNOU courses

Zero transgender enrolment for IGNOU courses

Pune: There has been zero enrolment of transgenders out of 2,231 total admissions across 13 districts under Pune region in January 2019 session of Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU). Even in Jan 2018, there was no enrollment from the transgender community.

The data is inclusive of all 13 districts under Pune region, which include Pune, Ahmednagar, Aurangabad, Jalna, Beed, Osmanabad, Satara, Sangli, Nashik, Nandurbar, Kolhapur, Dhule and Jalgaon. IGNOU had launched a scheme to exempt fees for transgenders in June 2017. However, that year, only one transgender had enrolled at the university. Later, there were no takers for any course from the community.

While recently Sakal Times had reported that transgenders had expressed that besides free education, they need social and economic security like hostel facilities and better scholarships to pursue education easily. 

“IGNOU has been taking up initiatives to facilitate the disadvantaged communities for several years. With similar intentions, the free education scheme was introduced for transgenders. However, we can extend more facilities if required. But certain aspects need to be considered while making any policies. Therefore, I cannot comment anything right now,” said VP Rupam, Deputy Director of Student Registration Division at IGNOU, New Delhi.

However, among the three centres in Maharashtra, Mumbai centre is the only centre to have enrolled nine transgenders for the current session. Nagpur also has zero enrollment along with Pune.
Apart from this, January 2019 session has shown a drop by 232 admissions in comparison to January 2018, which had 2,463 admissions. While the enrollments of rural and jail inmates have increased from 273 to 476 and 54 to 151 respectively in this session.

“In January session, mostly students, who couldn’t take admission into any college, enrol. While the June sessions are when maximum students are seen to have enrolled. Hence, the number can be seen considerably low,” said Masood Parveez, Regional Officer of IGNOU, Pune.

“Also, since most of the course takers are either working class or from different rural areas, the candidates even choose to discontinue for some time because IGNOU provides a validity of six years. Within this period, the candidate has to complete his/her degree at the university,” said Parveez.
Out of the total enrollments, 67 per cent are male candidates and 33 per cent are female candidates.

Admission Status of Jan 2019
Urban: 1,755
Rural :   476
Tribal :   1
SC :   192
ST :   45
Transgender :   0
Jail inmates:    151

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