On 5th July 2014, The Foundation for Working Women (TFWW) held its monthly fireside chat on the role of day care centres in facilitating women’s choice to work. In a country where less than a third of the female population is active in the economy, the onus of care-giving continues to be one of the primary factors deterring women from work. According to Education to Empowerment, a survey conducted by TFWW that explores the phenomenon of educated women “choosing” not to be in continuous full time employment, more than 2/3rds of the women have cited “family reasons”, primarily care-giving, as the key factor in being unable to work.
The fireside chat explored the factors that influence the acceptability and success of day care centres ranging from mindsets to quality. “After I came back from the US and put my child in a day care here, I realised I was considered part of the 1% of the horrible mums who dumped their children in day care,” said Deepti, a consultant and a working mother, indicating the need to overcome the prejudice towards the use of day care centres in India.
Smita Polite, a senior journalist, and mother to an eleven-year-old girl, added that even for mothers who do want to access day care centres, the lack of quality becomes a huge obstacle. “I had to quit work for more than four years because I couldn’t find a good day care for my daughter. I still wish I didn’t have to stop working then.”
The discussion emphasised the need for accessible and affordable quality day care infrastructure along with starting to look at day care centres as an essential issue for “working families”, not just “working women”.
Dr. Anju Khanna, chief mentor at IPSAA, a Gurgaon-based day care centre, highlighted the need for standards and benchmarking as we build quality day care infrastructure. She also said “we have to look at these as social infrastructure.”
The fireside chat marked the advent of TFWW’s research campaign on understanding the condition of day care centres in India and, the role government institutions and corporate need to play to plug the existent gaps and enable more working families.
About TFWW:
TFWW is an organisation founded by women professionals with the purpose of bringing more educated women into the workforce and retaining them in a sustainable and enabling environment. TFWW aims to facilitate progress for working women by creating awareness, impacting public policy and building infrastructure through public private partnership. For details, visit http://tfww.org
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