The Missing Half of Parental Rights: Paternity Leave, Labour Market Penalties, And the Future of Gender Equality in India

The question of whether paternity leave can materially alter women’s career outcomes has become a critical point of inquiry in contemporary debates on gender equality, labour regulation, and economic reform. Despite global evidence that men’s participation in early childcare significantly reduces the motherhood penalty and improves women’s long-term labour market outcomes1India's policy landscape remains marked by legislative silence and cultural inertia. The absence of a statutory paternity leave framework—contrasted sharply with the comprehensive, father-inclusive parental leave regime of Sweden2—reveals a deeper structural disconnect between legal reform, workplace realities, and entrenched gender norms3. While Indian labour law has expanded maternity protections, this unilateral emphasis inadvertently reinforces the patriarchal assumption that childcare is exclusively a woman’s responsibility4, thereby intensifying the very inequalities the law purports to remedy. This paper argues that the limited uptake of caregiving roles by men is not merely a social habit but a symptom of a broader institutional and economic architecture that structurally devalues unpaid domestic5. The persistence of the glass ceiling in India is thus closely linked to the legal invisibility of fathers and the economic hyper-visibility of mothers in the sphere of care 6. A comparative examination with Sweden—the global exemplar of gender-neutral and non-transferable paternity leave— demonstrates how a well-designed leave system can shift societal expectations, equalise career interruptions, and facilitate women’s upward mobility within the labour market7. The failure to establish similar reforms in India exposes a fundamental “equality gap”: a space where symbolic commitments to gender justice coexist with the practical perpetuation of women’s economic disadvantage 8. Ultimately, this paper contends that without legislating and normalising paternity leave, India’s aspirations for workplace equality will remain aspirational rather than transformative9, revealing a critical blindspot in the nation’s pursuit of substantive gender parity.