ENTER, THE HOUSE-HUSBAND

The switching of roles is still marginal, writes Osama Manzar
Understanding is the keyword, for any relationship to the functioning smoothly. Especially when the relationship is between a husband and a wife who are both quite educated, having their own identity, perception, desires, ambitions and careers. They have to live together and pursue and consensus, with out affecting each other’s independence.
Further. “The family is characterized by the interdependence of members on one another. This interdependent strengths mutual emotional bonds, generates a sense of solidarity and develops family pride. A kind of family consciousness and collective orientation is created, with distinguishes it from what seems to characterize a nuclear family,” writes Durganand Sinha, a psychologist.
Amidst this, a rearrangement of the family structure is taking place, where the man is entering the child’s nappies and performing many other chores, which he traditionally was no supposed to do. Says Pratap Pandey, a research scholar at Jawaharlal Nehru University. “The sexual division of labour in urban areas is not so clear cut now. While women are stepping outside to work, the men are having to stay back to look after the home. The reason is basically economic, but one could also talk about a change in the cultural mores of the urban family.
Take the case of Lata, a recently passed out post-graduate ad working in a magazine. She very often comes home late due to heavy workload in office. She says, “Almost everyday my husband prepares dinner for us and as soon as I reach home, in Munirka, he makes tea for me, as I feel very tired.
This is not all. Her husband always keeps hot water ready for her bath, by the time she arrives home since Lata is a late-riser and her husband gets up early, the morning tea is also served by her husband. “And, more surprisingly, he never lets me feel embarrassed for not being a traditional housewife,” says Lata.
However, for Lata’s husband it is a long crusade which he has been fighting and tough ‘” I feel very irritated sometimes for not behaving like a traditional husband, I eventually realize that since for a long time we have willfully subjugated women, it is high time, we do some justice to them. And, I really feel please when Lata assets herself and delivers commands.
“Yes, men are increasingly becoming more and more involved with children and home, compared to the last generation,” says Lalita Pannicker, an Assistant Editor of the times of India. She claims that her husband, trough an extremely busy person, routinely taken interest in all kinds of domestic responsibilities, especially in preparing their only son for school in the morning.
“It is no longer embarrassing for them.” Observes Lalita. “Changing nappies and shouldering household responsibilities are not more considered to be the jobs of hen-pecked husband. In Lilita’s case, he division of home labour is more or less decide or “rather understood.” But they take turns according to needs of the day, because Lilita’s husband. A media-person. “Some jobs have as also been assigned to the servants, so that we could have more time for each other,” says Pannicker.
Opines Ciccu Mukho Padhyaya, “It is more a matter of individuals how they resolve their houseghold problems, but I feel if one person, no matter male or females, I earning enough the other should stay back to take care of home and children.”
One cannot deny the fact, however, that this changing attitude of husbands is only restricted to a small segment of the enlightened elite and is an exclusively urban phenomenon, whose “determinant factor is more an economic necessity than culture mores”. Says Pandey, “It may, in a span of time, change the male psyche in the urban area, but it remains an extremely marginal phenomenon.”.   
And, this marginal sector, according to general opinion, is that of professional executives, layers, professors and people who have white-collar and blue-collar jobs.
“Though a change is taking place”, feels Imteyaz Ahmad, an eminent sociologist, “the males are not taking a substantive role. The burden of work as such has not been equally divided. It is only in the morning that the husband gets his child ready and sees him/her off to school, but he does that out of necessity.”
“Acceding to modern conception,” explain Ahmad, “marriage is a joint enterprise, where husband and wife should have equal choice, equal access to resources and equal sharing of work. But the change in attitude is so uneven that still it is the patriarchy that dominates, even in the most educated families, especially in matters of finance.”
An interesting case of such a family is that of a doctor husband and a lecturer wife, living in Lajpat Nagar. The doctor every month takes the entire salary of his wife and the amount increases with any increment the wife receives. “Unless access to resources becomes equal, empowerment of women will remain a dream,” says Ahmad.
It is interesting to note at this point, the women’s attitude in how far they are ready to project s well as accept their husbands in the new role. Ahmad’s case itself is an example as he narrates. “Being an egalitarian, I always used to wash utensils and had no qualms about doing such work, but I remember that my wife never wanted to project me as a kind of husband who shouldered household responsibilities”.
Suggests MS Gore, sociologists and ex-Vice Chancellor or Bombay University, “What may be more fruitful is the creation of a network of supportives that will make it easier for the husband and wife to meet their obligations toward each other and toward their children.”
Meanwhile, it is interesting to think about the effect this “more democratic role-model” will have on the children. Traditionally the father’s role was that of a tough one, interested only in their child’s education, teaching him maths and science. Whereas today, a child finds his father in the kitchen making food, in the bathroom washing clothes and every morning changing his clothes and making him ready for school. Now the child is equally nurtured by his father and mother.
Will this make the boy-child more caring? The girl-child more independent? Let us wait and watch the next generation.