VALUING' THE INDIAN HOUSEWIFE

An average Indian housewife is in-charge of doing everything at home from cooking, washing, cleaning, getting her children ready for school. She also shares her husband's work on their field and feeds the cattle. That's easily over 16 hours of home-related work, but she's left out of the economic grid that puts a value to what she does.
In fact, recently the government is thinking about to give her compensation for the work she puts in. The Ministry of Women and Child development is currently mulling over how women, who are home-makers, can be given a part of the husband's salary which to be directly transferred to her account at the end of each month. The Union Women and Child Development Minister, Krishna Tirath recently told NDTV, "We want women to call themselves house engineers. If we start counting their work it will also add to our economic growth. We want to empower women financially, and that in turn will empower them socially as well. A draft will only be made once we take in the views of all those concerned. We are still brainstorming."

In the current social set-up, it's not like we stay with our extended family. So taking care of children is a full time job. And who wants her kids to grow up just in the care of domestic help? But the other side of the idea sounds absurd sometimes. How does one actually start to quantify or put a value to all the things a mother or wife does? Will cooking for a special day add more value? Will tending to a child's broken heart or bruise come with a price tag? And what if the husband contributes to the chores in a week? Will that mean a deduction in what she should get? Hahaha…. What if the wife earns more than the husband? What happens then?" In that situation the husband should quit his job and do household chores that the wife does! I would conclude by suggesting that if the woman is an illiterate house wife then what the Government is contemplating appears proper; and if both husband and wife are working then the one whose income is less he/she should quit the job for child care and taking charge of the House as whole!! Today’s children need parental care to feel nice growing up experience as we had.