JNU witnesses sharp fall in women students and faculty; SC, ST representation declines
A new JNUTA report reveals a sharp decline in women and SC, ST representation at JNU over the past decade. Women students dropped below half the total strength, academic spending fell, and teachers blame policy changes and reduced university autonomy for the regression.
New Delhi: Over the past decade, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) has witnessed a sharp decline in the number of women students falling from a majority to less than half of the total student population. As per the State of the University Report (Updated October 2025) released by the Jawaharlal Nehru University Teachers’ Association (JNUTA), women students made up 51.1 per cent of the university’s strength in 2016–17, but that number dropped to 43.1 per cent in 2024–25.
Highlighting the growing gender gap, the report noted, ‘JNU’s past achievements in improving the social composition of the University’s student body, and increasing the proportion of women, have been reversed in the last few years and continue in that direction.’
The number of women faculty members has also fallen slightly. As of March 31, 2025, JNU had 208 women faculty which is just 29.7 per cent of the total 700, compared to 30 per cent in 2022 and 30.9 per cent in 2016.
End of ‘deprivation points’ system linked to fall in inclusion
The report suggests that this decline began after JNU stopped conducting its own entrance exams and scrapped the deprivation points system which earlier gave additional marks to students from disadvantaged backgrounds. These steps, JNUTA argued, had once helped improve diversity and inclusion in admissions.
The report also pointed out that the university’s environment ‘has become progressively unfriendly to women’ since 2017, when JNU replaced its Gender Sensitisation Committee Against Sexual Harassment (GSCASH) with the Internal Complaints Committee (ICC). JNUTA alleged that the ICC ‘works as an extension of the top administration rather than an ‘autonomous’ body,’ adding that ‘while the campus has become more and more unsafe with both security lapses and a general atmosphere of impunity for sexual harassers, reporting of cases to the ICC has decreased.’
SC, ST student numbers and academic spending fall
The decline isn’t limited to gender. Between 2021–22 and 2024–25, the number of Scheduled Caste (SC) students dropped from 1,500 to 1,143, while Scheduled Tribe (ST) students fell from 741 to 545.
Consequently, the SC share in the total student strength fell from 15 per cent to 14.3 per cent and the ST share dropped from 7.4 per cent cent to 6.8 per cent both below the reservation benchmarks.
The report blamed structural changes in admissions and governance including the use of the National Testing Agency (NTA) for entrance exams for the decline, saying that university bodies ‘no longer deliberate meaningfully’ on issues of social equity.
Sharp cuts in academic spending, rising student costs
Alongside the fall in diversity, the report said that academic investments at JNU have seen a ‘precipitous decline.’ Total academic expenditure (excluding exams) fell from Rs 30.28 crore in 2015–16 to Rs 19.29 crore in 2024–25, a 36.3 per cent drop. Spending on seminars and workshops went down by 97.2 per cent laboratory expenses by 76.3 per cent and fieldwork or conference participation by 79.6 per cent.
At the same time, the financial burden on students has gone up. ‘Even though JNU is no longer conducting entrance exams, it has compensated much of its loss of academic receipts by increasing the burden on students and applicants by charging them additional fees,’ the report said.
Academic receipts from student fees rose from Rs 240.8 lakh in 2015–16 to Rs 856.53 lakh in 2024–25.
The report also highlighted a decline in JNU’s research culture. ‘From a situation where (research students) constituted the majority, research students are now outnumbered by students in undergraduate and postgraduate programmes,’ it said, noting that their numbers fell from 5,432 in 2016–17 to under 3,286 in 2024–25.