Women still underrepresented in higher education leadership, holding just 11% of VC posts: Report
New Delhi: Despite women forming a significant share of the workforce in the education sector, their representation in top leadership remains alarmingly low. Data reportedly shows that only 11.18% of universities in India have women Vice-Chancellors (VCs).
“Out of 1,073 universities under the ambit of the Association of Indian Universities (AIU), just 120 have women VCs,” The New Indian Express quoted Pankaj Mittal, Secretary General of AIU, as saying. Of these, 16 positions are in universities where the VC post is exclusively reserved for female candidates. India has around 1,200 universities, with nearly 90% affiliated with the AIU.
While women are increasingly taking up mid-level leadership roles, such as Heads of Departments or Controllers of Examinations, the top post remains elusive. However, according to Mittal, the current situation marks a notable improvement from three years ago, when only 7% of universities had women VCs.
Prominent institutions currently with women VCs presently include JNU, Dr Ambedkar University Delhi, Kashmir University, Allahabad University and Chaudhary Charan Singh University (formerly Meerut University), Dr Hari Singh University (Sagar University), added the report.
Among states, Uttar Pradesh leads with 19 women VCs across its 84 universities. Tamil Nadu with 11 VCs in its 56 universities and Maharashtra with 10 women out of 79 universities take the second and third positions.
Highlighting the importance of gender-inclusive leadership, Mittal noted that women VCs often lead with a strong sense of purpose, championing initiatives that promote gender equity, mental health, student well-being, inclusive decision-making, and social responsibility. “Their presence sends a powerful message: that leadership can be both strong and compassionate,” she said.
However, invisible barriers and systemic biases continue to shape the path for women in higher education—as students, faculty, or aspiring leaders. “To break these barriers, institutions must move beyond symbolic gestures and commit to genuine, people-centric reforms,” she stressed.
Mittal addressed these concerns in her concept paper, Promoting Women-Led Development for Viksit Bharat, presented during the second national conference of women Vice-Chancellors recently held in Jharkhand.
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2019 mud attack on engineer: Maharashtra court sentences BJP minister Nitesh Rane to one-month jail
Mumbai (PTI): A court in Sindhudurg on Monday convicted Maharashtra minister Nitesh Rane in a 2019 case of pouring mud on an NHAI engineer when he was in opposition, and sentenced him to one-month imprisonment, noting that lawmakers are not supposed to take the law into their hands.
Later, the court suspended Rane's sentence, allowing him time to appeal before a higher court, while acquitting 29 other accused in the case.
"Even though Rane's intention was to raise a voice against the poor quality of work and inconvenience faced by the people, he was not supposed to humiliate or insult a public servant in public," additional sessions court judge V S Deshmukh stated.
"If such incidents continue to occur, public servants would not be able to discharge their duties with dignity," the judge noted.
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Calling the act "abuse of power", the court held that "it is the demand of time to curb such tendency".
Rane, a son of former Union minister Narayan Rane, was among 30 people charged under various offences, including rioting, assault to deter a public servant, and criminal conspiracy. He was in Congress when the incident occurred.
All the accused, including Nitesh Rane, were acquitted of these offences, as the court found insufficient evidence to support most of these claims.
However, the court found Nitesh Rane guilty of an offence under section 504 (intentional insult meant to provoke a breach of public peace) and sentenced him to one month's jail.
Rane, then a Congress MLA, had called the Sub-Divisional Engineer of the National Highway Authority, Prakash Shedekar, to a bridge over the Gad river in Kankavli on July 4, 2019, for inspecting the work to widen the Mumbai-Goa Highway.
According to the prosecution, Nitesh Rane and his followers, frustrated by the poor quality of the roadwork and waterlogging, confronted the engineer. They poured muddy water on Shedekar and forced him to walk through slush in public.
The court, after perusing the evidence on record, noted that the informant (victim) was holding a high post in the National Highway Authority.
"Despite that, he was made to walk through the muddy water in public. It would have certainly humiliated and insulted him," the court remarked.
The judge held that Rane compelling Shedekar to walk through the muddy water "was nothing but an intentional insult to the informant," and provocation which will cause him to break the public peace.
