Beyond Maternity Leave: A Shared Future for Care in India
Care is a quiet force that holds up families, workplaces, and economies. But it remains undervalued, often seen as a personal responsibility rather than a shared commitment. In India, care isn’t just about parents—it extends to grandparents, siblings, neighbours, and the many other individuals (often women) who look after children while working long hours away from their own. If we want to talk about caregiving policies, we must ask: who is being cared for, and who is being left out?
The Burden of Care: Who Gets Support, and Who Doesn’t?
India has made progress in recognising the needs of working mothers. The Maternity Benefit (Amendment) Act, 2017 extended paid leave to 26 weeks, a step forward—but one that still assumes that care is a mother’s job. Paternity leave, where it exists, is often too short to be meaningful, and workplace norms discourage men from taking it. Fathers who do step in often find themselves the exception, rather than part of a growing shift.
A father in Pune shared, “When my wife had to return to work, I stayed home with our child. But at work, it was seen as something unusual, almost indulgent—like I had taken time off rather than taken on a responsibility.”
For many families, care is not just about the parents. Grandparents, extended family, and childcare workers play critical roles, yet policies rarely acknowledge them. A grandmother in Mumbai reflected, “I love looking after my grandson, but it is a full-time job. It’s expected that I will step in, but there’s no real support for people like me who are also caregivers.”
Care for Whom? The Missing Conversation
The conversation around parental leave is often framed through a narrow lens—what works for those in salaried jobs with stable benefits. But in India, millions of individuals (often, women) working in informal and domestic labour don’t have access to maternity leave, let alone flexible childcare options.
Many families rely on nannies and live-in caregivers, but these women, often mothers themselves, face a starkly different reality. While they care for other people’s children, who looks after theirs? Paid care work remains undervalued and unprotected, with few safeguards for those who make other people’s careers possible. If workplaces truly want to support caregiving, they must think beyond policies that serve only the privileged few.
A childcare worker in Delhi put it plainly: “I live with the family I work for. I take care of their baby all day and night. My own daughter stays in the village with my mother. I see her once a year.”
A Future Where Care is Shared
India doesn’t need to look outside for solutions—it already has deep traditions of community-based care. The question is, how can policies support the realities of today’s families?
One approach is to expand the idea of who qualifies for caregiving benefits. In Sweden, a transferable leave model allows parents to share paid time off, normalising care as a shared responsibility. But what if we took this further? What if India’s policies recognised caregiving beyond just mothers and fathers—allowing leave to be shared across family members, or even offering support for those who provide care as a profession?
Flexible work arrangements, employer-supported childcare, and stronger protections for nannies and caregivers could create a system where care is not a privilege, but a right.
A mother in Bangalore shared, “I had to leave my job because there was no one to look after my child. If workplaces supported care beyond just maternity benefits, I wouldn’t have had to make that choice.”
Care is Not a Luxury—It’s a Foundation
A thriving society begins with care. It isn’t just about supporting parents—it’s about recognising the people who make care possible. By shifting the conversation from individual responsibility to collective investment, we can create a future where care is valued, shared, and sustained.
The question isn’t whether we can afford to invest in care. It’s whether we can afford not to.
