New Delhi, Jan 19 (PTI) The Centre is considering bring out a policy or scheme to bridge gender digital divide and ensure digital empowerment of socio-economically disadvantaged school girls, according to Ministry of Education (MoE) officials.
According to the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER), boys in the age group of 14-18 years are more than twice as likely to own smartphones compared to girls who are also less likely to know how to use these devices, even as there is a 17 per cent increase in accessibility of smartphones among the youths in the age group, up from 73 per cent in 2017 to 90 per cent in 2023.
“We are looking at possibilities to bridge this digital gap between girls and boys as digital empowerment of girls will have multiple positive social implications. Less girls are able to access educational content presumably due to not having a personal smartphone. We will workout a policy or scheme for this,” said a senior MoE official.
According to ASER 2023, close to 90 per cent of all youths have a smartphone in the household and know how to use it. Of those who can use a smartphone, males (43.7 per cent) are more than twice as likely to have their own smartphone than females (19.8 per cent). The percentage of females who can use smartphones was 89.8 per cent against 94.7 per cent for males.
ASER is a nationwide citizen-led household survey that provides a snapshot of the status of children’s schooling and learning in rural India. First implemented in 2005, the ‘basic’ ASER survey was conducted annually until 2014 and switched to an alternate-year cycle in 2016.
The ‘basic’ ASER collects information about enrolment in pre-school and school for children in the age group of 3 to 16, and assesses children aged 5 to 16 one-on-one to understand their foundational reading and arithmetic abilities. In the intervening years, ASER dives deeper into different aspects of children’s schooling and learning in rural India.
The ASER 2023 ‘Beyond Basics’ survey was conducted in 28 districts across 26 states, reaching a total of 34,745 youths in the age group 14-18 years. One rural district was surveyed in each major state, with the exception of Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, where two rural districts were surveyed.
The survey explored two components – a self-reported questionnaire capturing youths’ access to digital devices and their online habits – and an assessment of their digital skills – performing a set of tasks in front of the survey team using an available smartphone. According to MoE officials, there are notable positives to be drawn from the latest ASER report, one of which is the sharp decline in students of this age group working outside home.
“The number of rural youths working outside home has decreased from 41.6 per cent in 2017 to 33.3 per cent. What is more heartening is that the decrease in the number of girl students working outside home is even sharper — from 45.1 per cent to 28 per cent in this period. Among the reasons, it is primarily to supplement the household income. So we can presume that the income of the family has improved,” the official said. PTI GJS CK
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