Business & Finance

India’s Parental Leave Gap: Mothers Take 130 Days, Fathers Only 7

By Jocelyn Fernandes

A new study by the global hiring and payroll platform Deel found that India has the second‑widest gap between maternity and paternity leave among 12 major economies. The analysis, which covered nearly 5,000 parents, shows that the average Indian mother takes 130 working days of parental leave, while fathers take only seven days – the shortest paternal leave among the countries examined. The report notes that even when shared parental leave policies appear generous on paper, they do not always translate into equal leave‑taking in practice. Across the studied economies, mothers on long maternity leave experience a larger reduction in pay than fathers, particularly in the United Kingdom, where mothers on leave after four months receive less than half their usual take‑home pay. The study also found that mothers are more likely to use vacation days for parental leave, to take longer and less interrupted leave, and to leave their jobs after returning. Company size emerged as a significant predictor: mothers at larger employers took about 80 more days of leave than those at smaller firms. The gender gap persisted across demographics, country location, and leave entitlement policies. The report highlights that the gender pay gap widens sharply once children arrive and remains so for years, a phenomenon known as the “child penalty.” It suggests that when fathers take a larger share of leave, mothers tend to earn more later on. The 12 countries included in the study are Australia, Canada, France, Germany, India, Italy, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and the United States. The data covers full‑time employees on Deel’s platform, which skews toward white‑collar professionals.