Bharat's Cultural Pressure to Have A Baby - Noone Wants To Talk About It

Hi.


I have to take up this subject and write about it because I am seriously curious to know how many couples in my country really have kids because they really want to have one and how many of them have given up to the pressure or expectations that their parents, in-laws, other family members or friends or even co-workers put on them. I will not be surprised if more than 50% fail to handle the pressure and decide to have a first child. It does not stop there, after first child, expectations are to have a second child within 3-5 years after first child. 

I am not at all against having babies rather I love babies and I imagine I would have one ourselves one day but it is not difficult to understand that there are lot of problems in our country because we have been told to respect elders so much so that they do not allow people in their early or late 20s to decide when to do what. Most of the elders think they have managed to raise kids and they had kids in their 20s, the next generation should have one too. Ironically, not only that, just because your neighbor or someone they know had a kid hence they tell you to have a child too.


I never imagined that anyone would take so much interest in knowing when are we having baby. I am 29 years old now and my wife is 27, it is unbelievably annoying and funny at the same time to see family, friends and colleagues asking you when are you planning for a baby. My wife has to undergo tremendous pressure and needlessly had to answer people who do not even know us well enough. I will not be surprised to know if many couples give up their dreams and give up their ambitions to have a baby under this pressure or many of the couples do not even think what other things they would like to do if they do not have babies immediately but at a later stage of their life. I wonder how many married girls in their 20s face depression with such questions thrown at her by everyone.

I come from a background where most of the people around us are educated and understand they have no business to go on asking such questions to people like us but it is kind of a topic that people bring up when they have nothing more interesting to talk about. Since it is a part of culture, I assume it happens in all sections of the society and I feel sad for people who are poor and who can hardly feed themselves have to conceive a baby. 

I just hope sometime in the future this culture changes for good with people openly discuss about this culture and identify problems that they may create for a couple/family/society, they start respecting people's choices, or the least to expect is to start respecting women's choices. Hopefully, people will start giving some importance to individuality and they realize not everyone is alike and not everyone is competing against each other to have a baby. No surprise that Bharat is on its way to become the most populous country on the earth with limited resources it has.

Thanks for taking out time to read.