For the first time, women teachers outnumber men in India schools

IN a first, women teachers in Indian schools have outnumbered their male counterparts, a report by the Unified District Information on School Election 2019-20 revealed.

The country now has 49.2 lakh (4.92 million) female teachers as against 47.7 lakh (4.77 million) male teachers, compared to 35.8 lakh (3.58 million) female teachers and 42.4 lakh (4.24 million) male teachers in 2012-13.

However, it was also said that more women teachers were employed at the pre-primary level (over 1 lakh or 0.1 million women teachers to 27,000 men) while male teachers were more from the upper primary-level.

The gender ratio of teachers at the primary grade level saw 19.6 lakh (1.96 million) female and 15.7 lakh (1.57 million) male teachers.

More male teachers at higher levels with exceptions

In the upper primary classes, there are 11.5 lakh male (1.15 million) and 10.6 (1.06 million) female teachers. In the secondary classes, there are 6.3 lakh (0.6 million) male and 5.2 (0.52 million) female teachers. In higher secondary, there are 3.7 lakh male (0.37 million) and 2.8 lakh (0.28 million) female teachers.

However, states like Kerala, Meghalaya, Delhi, Tamil Nadu and Punjab saw more women teachers than men even in the higher grades. In government-aided schools, the number of male teachers are more whereas in private unaided ones, the female teachers dominate.

The teachers cater to almost 27 crore (270 million) students of pre-primary to higher secondary level from diverse socio-economic backgrounds in more than 15 lakh (1.5 million) schools across India, making the country’s school education system one of the biggest in the world.

The report also projected the total enrolment of students in 2019-20, saying 13.01 crore (130.1 million) boys and 12.08 crore (120.8 million) girls got into primary to higher secondary levels.

The report also suggested that the Gender Parity Index has been in favour of the girls at all levels of school education, with improvements seen the most at the higher-secondary level.

Children need to learn from teachers who can offer a male as well as female perspective. In younger classes, many schools in India prefer women teachers, since they are seen to be nurturing. However, I think it's good for male teachers to demonstrate nurture too! Otherwise, we're demonstrating a sexist bias in favour of women teachers," Maya Menon, founder director of The Teacher Foundation in Bangalore, India, was quoted as saying by Indian daily Times of India.

"In higher classes, traditionally both male and female teachers are sought after. There are also differential salaries in India between primary and secondary school teachers," she said, adding the scenario is not so in other countries where all teachers, regardless of the levels they teach, need small qualifications and begin with small pay. She also added that male teachers prefer to teach in secondary school because the payment is higher there, especially with government scales.