Measuring Inequality of Access to Higher Education in India

This paper uses data from the 71st NSS round (Education Survey: January–June 2014) to estimate the probabilities of person in India, between the ages of 18 and 22 years, of currently attending graduate or post-graduate courses in institutions of higher education , conditional on their social and economic status, their gender, their marital status, and their urban or rural location. It then examines inequality by social group in the quality of education received. Using the technique of inequality decomposition it estimates the proportionate contributions of the above factors to inequality in the interpersonal distribution of the probabilities of currently attending higher education. It compares how access to higher education has changed between the 64th NSS (July 2007–June 2008) and the 71st (January–June 2014) rounds of the NSS.