The internals of IIT qualifiers

There is a very telling study conducted by IIT Delhi and this might remove the perception which many have in their heads about how tuition classes help achieve students great success in life. Like those preparing for IIT entrance – many stay away from their homes for one year, taking a break from college, studying at the innumerable tuition classes for IIT that have cropped up at Kota, Rajasthan. It is a thriving town now, with the entire economy being run mainly by these IIT aspirants.

But IIT Delhi’s report shows that 52% candidates who qualified in 2013 got through only on account of self study and 48% had made it through coaching classes. With 61.4% candidates,  Guwahati zone shows highest percentage of candidates who prepared on their own and qualified. In Kanpur, 54.8% students qualified through self study, in Roorkee it was 55.1%, 52.6% in Mumbai. But in Delhi and Madras the percentage shifted – 52.9% students qualified had coaching classes and in Madras has the lowest percentage (39.4) of candidates taking to self-study, while 60.6% candidates relied on coaching centres.

In terms of urban-rural segregation, 75% if those qualified were from cities, 16% from towns and 8% from villages.  Also revealing was the fact that children of government employees (29.8%) topped the list of JEE qualified candidates while children belonging to business families accounted for 17.4% of the total candidates. 10% candidates were children of those in private sector. 

And if you thought that only a highly educated father could nurture a IIT student, you could not be more wrong.  42.7% candidates who qualified are kids of graduate fathers while only 27.9% candidates who cracked JEE came from families where the father is a postgraduate. 13.3% were children of matriculate fathers and 2.6% candidates had illiterate fathers.