Just finished reading Shobhan Bantwal's "The Forbidden Daughter" and I couldn't stop thinking about the menace of "aborting girls" which is, unfortunately, still gripping our society. The cultural preference for boys is skewing India's sex ratio. It is, indeed, an another form of gender violence against women.

Pre-natal sex determination test is illegal in India but that could not save up to 12 million girls (from 1980 - 2010) from not coming into this world. Every two hours in India, a woman dies of unsafe abortion but that did not affect the 620, 472 reported abortions in 2012. In such an abortion, not only foetus loses her life(can't call foetus "it", she is breathing already and is alive), mother's life is at high risk as well. Everyday around 2000 girls are killed in the womb or immediately after birth as told by India's Minister of Women and Child Welfare, Menaka Gandhi, though UN report says it is actually 7000 in number. This unethical sex determination and selective abortion of female infants is $224 million US industry in India. Ultrasounds and other sex-determining services have been readily available at cheaper rates these days and everyone can afford them.

Worst-Hit Areas

Why female foeticide?

Virat Kohli, with his performance, won our hearts yet again. I am a die hard fan of his batting style too but I am not talking about his most recent fantastic knock against Pakistan and Australia in World Cup T20. I absolutely loved his performance on social media today when he defended his ex-girlfriend, Anushka Sharma from a spate of trolls.



Anushka Sharma, a famous bollywood actress, who once was in a relationship with Virat Kohli, has to bear the brunt each time Virat Kohli succeeds or fails to score runs. If he scores and saves India from a defeat, people thank Anushka for leaving him and if he fails, they blame her to be in his life.

Most recently, Virat scored 82* of just 51 balls and helped India to save a berth in semifinals in World cup T20. When most of his fans were thanking him for his much needed and absolutely amazing knock, some fans were busy trolling Anushka Sharma instead and were thanking her for leaving him so that he can concentrate more on his cricket.

This is probably not the first time when Anushka Sharma is trolled but as wise and mature she is, she decides not to be affected by these idiotic trolls. She never responds to them and have always moved on in her life graciously.

Virat Kohli, showing self-respect and sensitivity, defended her this time on twitter and instagram. He spoke in her defence who always get agonized due to their past relationship.

Freedom of speech is not a licence to be stupid.

Just because we have freedom of speech,  it does not mean that we have a licence to abuse someone publicly. It just shows how responsible citizen we are towards our society and how illiterate we are, not forgetting to mention that it also shows the side of such mindsets where it is considered very convenient to suppress or malign any women easily. If we have freedom to post anything on the social media, we have to act with sensibility and compassion. When compassion is lost in the name of freedom of speech, we are no different than animals!

2016! When even a toddler knows that using his little finger he can toggle the digital gadgets, but the lady of the house still bears the onus of the dirty laundry in the home. The bigger the pile, the more frequent the laundry has to be.

Belonging to a typical Indian middle class family, I have never seen anyone but mom bearing the brunt of dad's still-stained collar of shirts, brother's complaints about his favourite pair of jeans scrubbed again and our school uniforms given a little imperfect blend of fabric whitener.

That nice and proud feeling when our school uniform looks brighter than the classmates in the morning assembly never made us think that how much effort our moms would have to put in making it stainless. Despite of having the best washing machine available, she would take out the shirts and scrub their collars manually so that it is spotless clean. I can't thank all the mothers enough for their unconditional love and working for us 24X7 irrespective of the fact if their household chores get appreciated or not.

Being independent for almost a decade and married for 2 years, I feel how unjustified this stereotypical thinking is. The lady of the house has to go through all these tantrums when she is doing laundry for us out of courtesy. She is not obliged to do it. It has been fed to our minds that laundry has to be done by the women only.

Married to a man who is so helpful in sharing household work like cooking, doing laundry, cleaning and doing dishes, made me feel blessed and also grieved for my friends when I hear their agonies of working full time in office and homes when their husbands are busy in watching TV after work.

Practically, women are considered cleaner than men (source). They also have lesser tolerance to mess and dirt but their intolerance towards the dirty pile of clothes should not be taken for granted. Traditionally, most of the women didn't go for work and stay-at-home wives which would ultimately be considered taking responsibility of the household chores like laundry.

Right from the beginning of our upbringing, we observe (not necessarily told) that mothers perform household chores like cooking, cleaning, doing the dishes and laundry while fathers are responsible for chores which need heavy-weight mechanical work. If somehow, they try to swap their duties, for example, a father starts doing dishes because mother is sick, the daughter is asked to do it instead because a father does not technically seem justified to do household chores. Have you ever seen any commercial for any product used in housework with a male model in it?



The above statistics clearly demonstrate that our society holds irrational prejudice against women that laundry is only their responsibility and men need not help them.

It is the high time to comprehend the genesis of such a stereotypical mindset. Where could we go wrong?

Women work outside the homes and share the responsibility of finances for household. Similarly, men should be equally liable for household chores. Helping each other in housework makes them spend quality time together. They tend to finish work quickly and they will have more time to relax after work rather than just exhausting wife. There should be no women designated work at home. After all, their home belongs to both of them.

Children are great imitators so give them something great to imitate.

Children tend to learn more from what we do than what we teach them. Seeing father doing laundry would inculcate the rational in them that no household chore is gender specific. Also, try to put some responsibility of little chores on their shoulders as well so that they keep their feet on ground and they grow up as a perfect exemplification of balanced household. Children can help their parents in laundry as well by separating clothes of different colours or folding their own little clothes.


Ariel came up with the following commercial which is an eye-opener and breaks the stereotypical convention that laundry is just mother's job and men should #sharetheload.

SORT - WASH - DRY - FOLD - IRON

I am joining the Ariel #ShareTheLoad campaign at BlogAdda and blogging about the prejudice related to household chores being passed on to the next generation.

"Dad, I want to pursue my higher education in Canada.", I said while trying to convince my Dad reluctantly.

"Beta, I'm glad you expressed it to me. Even my friend's daughter has gone to some college in Canada. I was thinking to ask you if you'd like to join the same college. She is liking it there. Let me know what do you want me to do to help you in this case."came his reply.

Wow! That was something unexpected or may be I was just underestimating my Dad. I jumped with joy and excitement as my half of the struggle is done.

"How would she survive there? Look at her! Such a thin girl who doesn't even know how to make tea for herself?" came a feeble voice of an old relative who was listening to the whole conversation between the father and the daughter.

"Have you gone mad? Aren't there enough colleges in India when you are trying to send her off this far? You are doing a mistake, I'm telling  you. You'll repent it later." the voice kept convincing my dad to change his decision.

My dad who is always firm in his decisions, replied, "You don't worry. She has every right to live up to her dream as much as her brother has! For your concern about her cooking skills, an empty stomach can make every one learn how to earn and learn".

Here I was, in 4 months and 12 days, breathing in Toronto.

Two years later
"Madamji, I'll take care of your luggage.", said the helper at the Delhi airport who looked in his early thirties.

"No, I am fine. Thank you. I can carry it by myself." was my reply after the worker was too keen on putting my luggage on the cart.

"Madamji, you are alone and look so weak. How would you carry and drag it all the way to the immigration counter by yourself?", said the helper resistantly, who could help other passengers who probably needed him more than me. He was keen on engaging himself in a conversation with me.

I was thankful to him for offering his help but he was judging me and was sympathizing with me because I was the only girl travelling alone and according to him, I looked weak and probably needed help. He also had thought that a girl travelling alone could be an easy target of his perversions. I could be tired after 30 hours of flight but not weak.

Not to sound arrogant, I ignored him completely and walked off quickly.

5 more years later
Weddings are the perfect excuses for me to visit India, where my heart belongs to. They say, "Home is where your heart is". I was in the midst of greeting relatives at the wedding I was attending and I was loving it to see everyone after such a long time.

"Namaste Auntieji! How have you been?" I greeted one of the aunties I was seeing after a long time.

"Namaste beta! You haven't changed a bit after so many years. I heard people have fair complexion and they are more stylish when they return from Canada after so many years, but you are still the same dusky girl!", came auntie's response to my greetings, pulling my cheeks simultaneously.

"For god sake auntieji, I was studying in Canada and working at 2 part-time jobs concurrently to pay off my studies. I didn't have maids like you to work for me. By the way, I didn't go to a different country to pursue how to look stylish and light skinned!" I whispered.

My mom standing next to me felt bad as well and she replied to auntie on my behalf, "Since my daughter is too nice to respond you on this, let me tell you that she is a university gold-medallist and a post-graduate with honours from a Canadian University. She neither puts make-up on nor does she dress to please anyone. She is capable enough to express herself through what she has achieved not what others perceive. By the way, Canada does not offer beauty classes where Indian people can go and turn white."

Whoa! My mom just turned into Jhansi ki Rani who fought for her daughter, proud of you mom!



How many of us though will have to face this criticism based on our appearances because definitely not everyone of us is going to be saved by moms and that too everytime, right?

• 69% of men agree that their judgement of women is based on their looks.
• 64% of women agree that the judgements passed on them have affected their ability to reach their true potential.
• 70% of women agree that majority of judgements on women are from family members or friends rather than strangers.
• 72% of women agree that working women face more judgements on their looks or their clothes than housewives.