PANAJI: Around 60% of students enrolled at the graduate and postgraduate level in Goa are girls.
Yet, in hostels attached to institutes of higher education in Goa, the hostel space available to girls is lower than the facilities available for boys.
Similarly, actual occupancy of hostels by female students too is lower, as per the all-India survey on higher education (AISHE) 2019-20, released on Thursday.
Academicians said that for a state with one of the best female gross enrolment ratios in higher education, there seems to exist a cultural reluctance to let girls reside in hostels.
At the undergraduate level, 57% of students pursuing education through regular mode in Goa are girls.
At the postgraduate level, this percentage is even higher, with 63.5% of the enrolment being girls.
One would think this would automatically translate into a higher number of hostel spaces for girls.
But the hostel beds available for females are lower by almost 1,000 as compared to boys, with 2,967 beds for boys and 2,059 beds for girls.
It appears that hostel bed availability is linked to demand, as with 1,940 boys and 1,301 girls residing in hostels, female hostel occupancy is lower by more than 600 students.
“There is some reluctance from families in letting female students opt for hostels,” said former Goa University registrar Vijayendra Kamat.
“A lot of our local Goan students do not prefer hostels at all,” said one woman academic.
Some even spend two hours travelling by to GU from as far as Quepem.” This is probably a cultural thing.
Hostel culture is new in Goa.
And a lot of the male students living in Goa are actually those from outside Goa,” said one woman academic.
Academicians said that after upgradation of hostel facilities at Goa University, at least at the varsity level, the number of hostel spaces available for female students were on par or more than those available for male students.
However, she said that the resistance to living in a hostel was more from families when it comes to female students in Goa.
The cost of living in a hostel was high, and the preference from families to spend more on boys’ education also cannot be ruled out, she said.
“Usually, a majority of students from the science stream stay in hostels because they have lab work to do.
Staying in hostel allows one more time to be connected academically, and there is no exhaustion of long bus travels, but no matter how much I try to convince female students, they are not willing.
Unlike in places like Pune, where even their grandparents have lived in hostels, in Goa, we have many first-generation learners.
It is also a cultural thing that they feel safer if the girls stay home and travel for studies,” said the female professor.
Academicians also said that across the country, rules tend to be stricter when it comes to girls’ hostels than boys’ hostels, which could also be one contributing factor.