Rural Youth in Higher Education in Punjab: A Survey of Parental Attitude and Facilities Available Within Home

India is facing a lot of challenges in the higher education system. One of the major challenges in the modern society is gender disparities especially in the rural areas and among the disadvantaged and marginalized communities. Other challenges include, lack of quality education, non-accessibility of higher education to rural youth, higher rate of dropout among the rural and marginalized sections of the society. It is true that enhancing social access to higher education is still important in the country, but the major challenge before the Indian higher education system is to bring equity in quality of education in the country.
Though the literacy rate is improving in India, but still there is a huge gap between male-female literacy rates and rural-urban literacy rates. The opportunities of attaining higher education are not equal for all. Most of the higher educational institutions are in urban areas and the students from villages have to face a lot of difficulties to complete their degrees.
With these observations in mind, the present paper gives an analysis of the higher education scenario in Punjab. It presents a case study of the rural youth in higher education with special reference to the parental attitude and facilities provided to the rural youth at home to pursue their education.