Journal of Development Research

Affirmative Action During the Time of Enrolment in Higher Education in India: An Investigation

Sanghita Ghosh¹ and Amit Kundu²

First Published 20 May 2025. https://doi.org/10.1177/22297561251331666

Article Information

Corresponding Author:

Amit Kundu, Department of Economics, Jadavpur University, Kolkata, West Bengal 700032, India.
Email: akundu29@gmail.com; amit.kundu@jadavpuruniversity.in

¹Department of Economics, Adamas University, Kolkata, West Bengal, India

²Department of Economics, Jadavpur University, Kolkata, West Bengal, India

Creative Commons Non Commercial CC BY-NC: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (http://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-Commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed.

Abstract

The effect of the affirmative action policy on higher educational enrolment in India is addressed here. This article tries to identify the factors that play important roles in enhancing the enrolment of young people from ethnically disadvantaged groups, specifically Scheduled Castes (SC), Scheduled Tribes (ST) and Other Backward Classes (OBC) in higher education. Using the probit regression technique, it finds that females from ST communities have a lower chance of enrolling in higher education. Conversely, the probability of young females participating in higher education is higher in the OBC community. At the household level, household income, smaller family size and household location increase the probability of enrolment in higher education among young individuals from the three castes considered. Furthermore, a larger number of higher educational institutions and increased government spending on higher education also contribute to higher enrolment rates for young individuals from these socioeconomically disadvantaged households.

Keywords

Higher education, SC, ST, OBC, NSSO, probit model

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