That Women’s Day is a load of bull must be obvious even to the most naïve. It is another excuse to dress in festive finery to work, get free food in the office canteen, take part in school-like fun-and-games organized by the HR. Yes, people—women—do enjoy it, do appreciate it, do have fun.

And then I see innumerable women—friends, acquaintances, colleagues, ex-colleagues, cousins—struggle to cope with keeping house and job together. Countless women I know manage their homes while being at work—no, not at the cost of their work, but along with their work. Some electricity line at home has blown a fuse, the woman is juggling mouse, keyboard, computer monitor, and a reluctant electrician on the phone; the ayah has not turned up and the mother-in-law cannot manage the cooking and baby together, the woman is on the phone (the blessed phone!) with a friend/sister/sister-in-law/neighbour/playschool trying to get a replacement ayah… I don’t need to go on, you know what I mean.

Yes, the husband could/should do part of this. But that is another long, and long-standing, debate. Let us focus on this one point for the moment: Women have to manage their homes and their office simultaneously. And this is only worse for women with small children.

Seeing all the women-with-small-children around me on this Women’s Day I wondered: They are all educated, “emancipated” in many ways, financially more independent that most others; then why don’t all these strident, forceful, assertive, liberated women do something about this? Especially women who are in professions—journalism, law, social activism, teaching—that are supposed to help the less privileged become more aware of their rights?

I do a bit of online browsing. And then I come across this:

Central Government Act
Section 48 in The Factories Act, 1948
(1) In every factory wherein more than 1[ thirty women workers] are ordinarily employed there shall be provided and maintained a suitable room or rooms for the use of children under the age of six years of such women.
(2) Such rooms shall provide adequate accommodation, shall be adequately lighted and ventilated, shall be maintained in a clean and sanitary condition and shall be under the charge of women trained in the care of children and infants.
(3) The State Government may make rules--
(a) prescribing the location and the standards in respect of construction, accommodation, furniture and other equipment of rooms to be provided under this section;
(b) requiring the provision in factories to which this section applies of additional facilities for the care of children belonging to women workers, including suitable provision of facilities for washing and changing their clothing;
(c) requiring the provision in any factory of free milk or refreshment or both for such children;
(d) requiring that facilities shall be given in any factory for the mothers of such children to feed them at the necessary intervals.

Incredible! You mean, not only is this a woman’s right, it is actually a law? A law like any other law? A law that should invite penalty / punishment when it is not followed? Like the law that says stealing is a punishable offence?

I am sure I am really late to this knowledge but, in my defence, I don’t have children who I have to manage remotely, or tear myself away from every morning to go earn a living. But what about the many women I know who do?

So, here’s a question for all the working mothers who are reading this: Will you ask your HR department why you don’t have a crèche in your office?
You tear yourself away from your toddler every morning. It breaks your heart; it breaks hers/his. Can you do this for yourself? For the bewildered eyes that wonder where you disappear for several hours together?

Sure you can. But will you?
Or will you remain content with the free canteen food on the next Women's Day?