From the local to the global level, Women in India continue to struggle to have an equal opportunity in education and Government jobs. This occurs despite their proven abilities as leaders and agents of change, and their right to participate equally in democratic administration.
Gender gaps in education feed into gender gaps in employment as well. Government is continuously making efforts to motivate women by providing fee exemptions and making it convenient for women to reach the examination centres which are alloted according to their preferences. As a result, there has been an increase by approximately 25% in female applications for SSC exams.
In some industries involving engineers like Civil and mechanical engineers, the nature of the work has made it difficult to hire more women. But there has been an increase of 26% in the number of female candidates appearing for SSC JE this year.
While women are given less opportunities to represent themselves in powerful positions,they have proved that they are equally deserving as men. The success rate of females who appeared in UPSC 2019 is 14.6% which is more than double than that of males which is 7% .
In this article, we cover the efforts made by the leading Commissions- UPSC and SSC, to attain gender equality and its outcome in recent years.
Efforts made by the Commission to Increase the Participation of Women Candidates in SSC and UPSC:
Half of the world’s populace is made up of women, however their association within the workforce is excessively little in many areas. It demonstrates the relevance of the recently celebrated International Women’s Day, which supports gender diversity and highlights women’s contributions and their rights in different areas. There have been many changes over the years, but more needs to be done to give women more opportunities to grow in the education and workplace.
In order to have a gender balance in the workforce, various commissions like The Staff Selection Commission(SSC), Union Public Service Commission(UPSC) are making constant efforts to encourage women candidates to appear in the prestigious examinations conducted by them.
To achieve this objective,
- a caption is prominently displayed on the first page of every advertisement which reads as “the Government strives to have a work force which reflects gender balance and women candidates are encouraged to apply”.
- SSC and UPSC have also mentioned earlier that all women candidates, irrespective of their category, are exempted from payment of the examination fee.
- Often it is seen that women do not apply for exams due to lack of transportation or their parents are not willing to spend more on their daughters. While allotting examination venues, these Commissions also take adequate precautions to ensure that women candidates are subjected to the least inconvenience. For this, women are usually allotted the examination centres according to their preferences only, to ensure minimum dislocation and inconvenience.
Result of the Mentioned Efforts:
Increase in Female Participation
Women have given their best whenever they are provided with fair opportunities. With the continuous efforts made by the Commissions, it can be observed from the statistics given below that women participation has been significantly increasing.
SSC Recruitment Examination
During the year 2020-21, out of a total of 1,54,06,743 applications, 48,76,066 applications were received from women candidates for the All India Open Competitive Examinations. Women candidates therefore accounted for 31.65% of the total candidates during the year 2020-21 as against 30.52% and 25.34% during the previous years.
Civil Services Examination
The number of women candidates recommended for appointment on the basis of the results of the Civil Services Examination, 2019 was 220 as against 193 in the year 2018. The number of women candidates who appeared in the Main Examinations of CSE, 2018 and CSE, 2019 were 1362 and 1510 respectively. The number of women candidates interviewed on the basis of CSE, 2018 and CSE, 2019 were 364 and 454 respectively.
Most Popular SSC Posts for Women Candidates
Across various posts offered by the Staff Selection Commission(SSC), the maximum number of women applied for the Junior Hindi Translator, Junior Translator, and Senior Hindi Translator Examination, 2020, wherein women candidates accounted for 42.25% of the total candidates. This was followed by the SSC CGL (2020) in which the women candidates constituted 37.97% of the total candidates.
However, the minimum number of applications of women candidates was recorded in the Junior Engineers (Civil, Mechanical, Electrical, Quantity Surveying & Contracts) Examination, 2020, which was only 19.12%.
Year-Wise Comparison in the above Mentioned Posts
The data shows that there has been an overall increase in women participation and there was a significant increase in the number of women participating in the Junior Engineers Exam in 2020-21.Candidates can also apply forSSC CHSL which is also one of the most important SSC examinations.
Age-Wise Statistics of Female Candidates in Civil Services Examination, 2019
In the graphical representation provided below, the highest percentage (35.0%) amongst the appeared female candidates in Civil Services (Preliminary) Examination 2019, were from the age group of 21-24 years. But in Civil Services (Main) Examination 2019, maximum 29.8% of the female candidates appeared from the age group of 24-26 years and at the recommendation stage, the highest percentage (32.3%) of the female candidates recommended were also from the age group of 24-26 years.
UPSC Success Rate: Male Vs Female
Community and Gender-wise Success Rate of Candidates in Civil Services (Main) Examination, 2019 is shown in the table below:
From the above table, it seems that the performance of female candidates belonging to various communities viz. Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backward Classes, Economically Weaker Section and General category was better than that of male candidates of corresponding Community.
Out of 1,510 female candidates who appeared in the Civil Services (Main) Examination, 2019, total 220 were recommended for appointment, registering a success rate at 14.6 percent. As against this, 702 out of 9,964 male candidates were recommended which represents a success rate at 7.0 percent. Thus, the success rate of female candidates was significantly higher than that of male candidates.
Number of Attempts taken by female candidates
It can be concluded from the table given below that a greater percentage of Women candidates cleared the Civil Services Examination, 2019 in less number of attempts as compared to men.
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