The Mount Carmel College (MCC) in Bengaluru, a renowned institution that has exclusively catered to women for 75 years, has recently announced its plan to transform into a co-ed college from the 2024-25 academic year. Speaking to TNM, Principal George Lekha said that the change comes amidst the college’s aspiration of securing a ‘deemed to be university’ status.
“We celebrated our platinum jubilee recently, so having reached this milestone, we thought it is time to embrace change. We are also looking to move to a deemed-to-be university status, so with that in mind, we wanted to make a number of changes. We have already implemented a few changes such as introducing new age programmes. We will most likely get the status by next year so we thought this was the time to begin the change,” she said.
Established in 1944 as 'Carmel College' under Madras University in Trichur in Kerala, MCC stood as one of the pioneering women's colleges. In 1948, it was relocated to Bengaluru. Technically, the college is already open to male students seeking admissions in post graduate courses since 2016 and has about 15 male students studying on the campus.
Now that the college has taken the decision to become a co-education institute, how many male students will be admitted? That’s not been decided yet. The principal said that the management is yet to decide on the percentage of boys that will be admitted into the college, saying that the change will be ‘extremely’ gradual. However, the college has already begun accepting applications from male students for the 2024-25 academic year.
“I feel change is for the better, it is progressive thinking and we believe in inclusivity. Very soon, our girls will be out in the world and there is no workspace which is an all women’s workspace, so we are preparing our students so that they can manage better. Our tagline for the platinum jubilee has been about moulding confident, competent and compassionate Carmelites, so we need to work towards it,” she added.
TNM also spoke to the students studying at the college and a section of them said they were indifferent to the change, since they come from co-ed schools. Meanwhile, multiple other students voiced concerns about their safety and fear that their freedom would be curtailed.
“We do not feel this change is good. Being a women’s college, the environment offers a safe space for us, we feel free here. With the college being open for boys we feel a lot of our freedom will be restricted and this will no longer remain our safe space,” said a student.
“Many of us joined the college specifically because it was an all women’s college. With such a drastic change, we fear that a lot of us coming from conservative families will have to drop out and look for other women’s colleges which will be a huge disruption in our studies,” said another.
The principal also agreed that the overall reaction to the move has been mixed. She said that while there has been positive reaction with the institute and management receiving congratulatory messages, there were also concerns and apprehensions from the students.
“It is understandable that students have certain concerns and apprehensions but we will be with our students addressing those problems and that won't be an issue at all. This change was not decided overnight. We will ensure all the changes and policies that are needed are done. We will be with our students,” principal George Lekha said.