Doctors' kids have best success rate in IIT-JEE: Report

NEW DELHI: Doctors, it seems, are more keen on seeing their kids as engineers than parents from any other profession, even engineering. At least that's what data released to the Union HRD ministry by the organizing committee of IIT-JEE 2008 suggests. Of the 6,123 children of medical professionals who took the IIT entrance exam this year, 421 succeeded in securing a seat in the elite engineering institutes.

That gives children of doctors a success rate of 6.9%, way above the hit rate of 4.3% enjoyed by kids of engineers.

In fact, data compiled in previous years tell a similar story. In 2007, children of medical professionals had a success rate of 6.9%, as compared to 5.2% of engineers' children. In 2006, it was 4.4% versus 3.6%.

"More and more children are coming to engineering as those pursuing medicine take much longer to establish themselves. For most students, doing engineering and then an MBA is the most lucrative option. This could probably explain why children of doctors are migrating towards engineering," said JEE chairperson from IIT-Delhi, R Chattopadhyay.

Many children of doctors say their parents actively encouraged them to take up engineering. Nupur Mangla, a student of IIT-Delhi whose parents are both doctors, said, "My parents encouraged me to join IIT because I wanted to do engineering and also because they thought medicine was a difficult profession."

"The kind of academic rigour that doctors inculcate in their children helps them get through a test like JEE," Mangla added.

A total of 3,11,258 students appeared for JEE-2008, of which 8,652 cleared the exam. According to the report given to MHRD, the maximum number of aspirants taking the JEE are children of government employees. This year, 1,24,582 students whose parents were in government or public service, appeared for JEE. Only 3,659 of them qualified, resulting in a success rate of 2.9%. It was 3.4% last year and 2.3% in 2006.



A huge number of businessmen's children also appear for JEE. Their number was 58,092 this year, 43,982 in 2007 and 49,319 in 2006. "I wanted my son to join our business initially, but when he said he wanted to do engineering, I insisted that he pursue chemical engineering since we have a chemical factory. I believe, with his education at IIT and some work experience later, my son will help our business grow," said S K Arora, a businessman whose son passed out of IIT-Delhi this year and is now working with a pharma company.

Children of agriculturists also make up a huge part of those appearing for JEE with 33,271 of them taking the test this year and 374 ultimately qualifying. Students whose parents are teachers have had an average success rate of 3% over the years, with the children of lawyers and private sector employees coming next with an average hit rate of 2.9%.

Courtesy: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com