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The number of supernumerary seats created for women at the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) has more than doubled since 2022. Yet women's share of total IIT admissions has moved only marginally, raising questions about how much further the expansion has changed the gender balance at the country's premier engineering institutes.
According to the Joint Implementation Committee reports for JEE Advanced, the IITs had 1,567 female supernumerary seats in 2022. By 2026, the number had risen to 3,776 female-only seats, an increase of about 141%.
The seats are created over and above the regular intake to improve women's representation in undergraduate programmes, rather than taking seats away from male candidates.
The expansion is part of a policy introduced in 2018 to address the low number of women entering IITs. The aim was to bring female enrolment in undergraduate programmes to at least 20%.
The increase has also coincided with growth in the overall IIT seat pool. Total seat capacity rose from 16,598 in 2022 to 18,826 in 2026, an increase of around 13.4%.
The 2026 JIC report records 18,861 seats allotted in the final round of counselling, including the female-only seats and other supernumerary allotments.
| Admission metric | 2022 | 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
Female supernumerary seats | 1,567 | 3,776 | 140.9% increase |
Total IIT seat capacity | 16,598 | 18,826 | 13.4% increase |
Total seats allotted | 16,635 | 18,861 | 13.4% increase |
Women allotted seats 
| 3,310 | 3,814 | 15.2% increase |
Women's share of total allotments Important Announcement EasyShiksha has officially launched the Online Internship Program โAb India Sikhega Ghar Seโ | 19.90% | 20.22% | +0.32 percentage points |
The rise in additional seats has helped sustain women's representation at around one-fifth of IIT admissions, but the overall share has not increased dramatically in recent years.
In 2022, 3,310 women secured IIT admissions, accounting for about 20% of the 16,635 seats allotted. In 2026, 3,814 women were allotted seats, representing 20.22% of the 18,861 total allotments. Of these, 37 women secured seats through the gender-neutral pool.
The numbers show that more women are entering IITs in absolute terms, even as their proportion of the total intake has remained broadly stable.
The expansion of female-only seats has increased the number of opportunities available to women without reducing the regular seat pool. But the latest figures also show the limits of looking at seat numbers alone: a larger number of additional seats does not automatically translate into a substantially higher share of women in the overall intake.
The next question is whether more women will enter the JEE pipeline, qualify for the examination and choose engineering programmes, alongside continued efforts to improve representation on IIT campuses.
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