IIM Kozhikode’s new MBA batch sets a record: Two out of every three students are women | Education News
3 min readNew DelhiJul 5, 2026 10:46 AM IST
The latest MBA batch at the Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Kozhikode has rewritten a long-standing trend in management education. For the 2026-28 academic session, nearly two out of every three students admitted to the institute’s flagship Post Graduate Programme (PGP) are women. In a statement, the institute shared that this marks the highest female representation ever recorded in the history of the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs).
The institute inducted 599 students across its three full-time MBA programmes and 99 doctoral scholars during its inauguration ceremony for the new academic year.
| Year, Batch | Women Students |
| 2013 (PGP-17) | 54% |
| 2021 | Above 50% |
| 2024 | 59% |
| 2026 | 66% |
IIM Kozhikode’s flagship PGP has seen a steady rise in women’s representation over the years
The biggest milestone came in the flagship PGP, where 329 of the 499 admitted students are women, taking female representation to nearly 66%. The figure sets a new benchmark across the IIM system and continues IIM Kozhikode’s decade-long focus on improving gender diversity in management education.
The institute has steadily raised the share of women in its flagship MBA over the years. It became the first IIM to cross the 50% mark in 2013, when women made up 54% of the PGP batch. It again crossed 50% admissions in 2021. In 2024, the proportion rose to 59%, then the highest among the older IIMs. The latest intake has now pushed that figure to 66%.
Across all three full-time MBA programmes, women account for nearly 63% of the incoming class.
Programme-wise, the flagship PGP has 499 students, of whom 329 are women. The Post Graduate Programme in Liberal Studies and Management (PGP-LSM), which has admitted its seventh batch, enrolled 51 students, with women making up 82% of the cohort. The Post Graduate Programme in Finance (PGP-Fin) admitted 49 students, with women accounting for 12% of the intake.
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The incoming batch also reflects a shift in academic backgrounds. Non-engineering graduates now form the majority in the flagship MBA programme.
Among the flagship PGP students, 57% come from non-engineering disciplines. The share is even higher in PGP-LSM, where 96% of students are from non-engineering backgrounds, while PGP-Fin has 45% non-engineers. Overall, 59% of students across the three MBA programmes come from non-engineering disciplines.
Alongside the MBA programmes, IIM Kozhikode also inducted 99 doctoral scholars into its research ecosystem.
Of these, 27 scholars joined the regular Doctoral Programme in Management (DPM). Women constitute 66% of this cohort, making it the highest-ever female representation in a regular PhD batch at the institute. Another 72 scholars joined the Executive Doctoral Programme.
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This year’s intake also includes the inaugural batch of the Doctoral Programme in Management (Teaching Track), IIM Kozhikode’s newest doctoral programme designed to prepare future management educators and researchers.