We are given a total of 7 men and a total of 6 women. Now, we have to select five persons to form a committee out of which at least 3 should be men, which means the minimum number of men is 3, therefore we get the following three cases in which the committee can be formed.
Let's take a look at the three cases:
Case I: Here, in the committee of 5 persons we have 3 men and 2 women, therefore the total number of ways that can be done is by selecting 3 men from 7 men and 2 women from 6 women. Now, for this we will apply the combination formula for selecting objects from a total of \(n\) objects: \({ }^{n} C_{r}=\frac{n !}{r !(n-r) !}\)
So, the ways in which we select 3 men from 7 men and 2 women from 6 women are as follows:
\(\Rightarrow{ }^{7} C_{3} \times{ }^{6} C_{2}=\left(\frac{7 !}{3 !(7-3) !}\right) \times\left(\frac{6 !}{2 !(6-2) !}\right)=35 \times 15=525 \quad\quad\ldots \ldots(1)\)
Case II: Here, in the committee of 5 persons we have 4 men and 1 woman, therefore the total number of ways that can be done is by selecting 4 men from 7 men and 1 woman from 6 women. Now, again we will apply the combination formula: \({ }^{n} C_{r}=\frac{n !}{r !(n-r) !}\)
So, the ways in which we select 3 men from 7 men and 1 woman from 6 women are as follows:
\(\Rightarrow{ }^{7} C_{4} \times{ }^{6} C_{1}=\left(\frac{7 !}{4 !(7-4) !}\right) \times\left(\frac{6 !}{1 !(6-1) !}\right)=35 \times 6=210 \quad\quad\ldots \ldots(2)\)
Case III: Here, in the committee of 5 persons we have 5 men and 0 women, therefore the total number of ways that can be done is by selecting 5 men from 7 men and 0 women from 6 women. Now, again we will apply the combination formula: \({ }^{n} C_{r}=\frac{n !}{r !(n-r) !}\)
So, the ways in which we select 5 men from 7 men is as follows:
\(\Rightarrow{ }^{7} C_{5}=\left(\frac{7 !}{5 !(7-5) !}\right)=21 \quad\quad\ldots \ldots(3)\)
Now, we will be adding all these cases to get the total number of ways in which five persons are selected to form a
committee so that at least three men are in the committee, therefore from equation 1,2, and \(3:\)
\(525+210+21=756\)