leaning in – The Indian Scene

continued from ……….. lean in

What struck me in the book was the frequent references to India and a number of anecdotes where Indian names figure. (some of the names, originated in India and corrupted in America ). Foreword is by Naina lal Kidwai. Wherever statistics are quoted, besides US, the only other country considered is India. As always, these figures cannot be verified and a database can confess to any crime, if tortured long enough. Here’s one,

….According to the most recent analysis, when a husband and wife both are employed full-time, the mother does 40 percent more child care and about 30 percent more housework than the father. In, India women do more than ten times as much child care and thirty times as much housework as men …

When you see some of the specimens in the category of ‘working moms’ , pregnant or not, you will be tempted to name every project in every organization as ‘Project Whale’. If only they do 10 % of what is projected they would have been leaner long before Sheryl Sandburg thought of leaning in.

That brings me to a gem of a theory from SS, though it is not directly linked to lean in.

..We overcome biology with consciousness in other areas. For example, storing large amounts of fat was necessary to survive when food was scarce, so we evolved to crave it and consume it when it’s available. But in this era of plenty, we no longer need large amounts of fuel in reserve, so instead of simply giving in to this inclination, we exercise and limit caloric intake.

It means Nature intended us to be fat and we fight Nature to be fit. How preposterous !

So how will lean in affect the Indian work-space and Indian homes?

I’ll try not to be judgmental, but make an attempt to foresee the trend. More and more women will strive for a career and compete to reach top posts. They will fight at home if need be, to preserve their career prospects. Young girls may delay marriage or altogether avoid marriage. Once married , they would delay child berth or avoid child birth if not assured of help from organization and husband in child care. I am not sure if Indians will as readily as Americans resort to reformatting and reconfiguration of career or marriage , if bugs persist. So wherever things don’t work out, struggle will be long and bitter. Of course men will change, for peace at home or simple economy, if not due to change of heart.

In traditional male bastions like defence forces, induction of women will increase, but for whatever reason the ladies will take a lion’s share of the desk jobs which normally is occupied by war wounded soldiers or soldiers returning from exceptionally difficult assignments.

The X factor

The X factor in India is affordable domestic help and help from grand parents. The leaning in couple will make most of this factor to ‘lean on’ any such available help.

Apparent Anomalies

Sunday times will continue to be popular for matrimonial advertisements. Bharat matrimony will continue to be the first web page viewed, for many parents, irrespective of whether their children or leaning in or not. Big fat Indian weddings will continue to be funded by parents and brothers and rarely by sisters. Sons are likely to remain ‘number one , in-demand offspring’ when it comes to looking after parents or dependent siblings.

Another term that I learnt from SS.

…He cooks and cleans more, knows the details of the schedule, and is happy to be the ‘ number one, in-demand parent’ for half the week….

All this applies to the affluent regions; in the islands of California in a sea of sub–Saharan Africa. Where even survival of a girl child is an issue, lean in will have no effect . The real work for empowerment of women would be in this area. One startling fact is that the skewed sex ratio is not due to poverty but due to the fact that a girl is perceived to be a liability on the family balance sheet, be it an affluent household or not. The greatest service that anyone can do is to change that perception across the country and to change a perception some realities have to change.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply