Women chart own course

Hyderabad: In a recent trend, more and more husbands are actually relocating – to other states, countries or continents – to enable their wives or partners rise higher in their careers. These changing dynamics at the workplace are having some profound implications on the society and the way families function today.

According to an Accenture report, over 90 per cent couples feel that career capital is the success mantra. “The traditional notion of men being the bread-winners is fading among independent working couples. Given that these relationships have greater understanding, there is no scope for insecurity. So, the husband sees the wife as an equal and shares responsibility,” said Sonal Andrews, director, Integrated Pre-school Teacher Training Academy.

The trend of husbands working from home to help their partners grow is increasing too. Sushmita Balasubramaniam, vice-president (retail), IMRB said: “My husband, who worked earlier in the telecom sector, quit his job to work from home as a property consultant. Around the time, I got a good offer and took it up because my husband managed the house.”

However, Arpitha Takkallapally, a senior software programmer at an MNC in California, has a different story. Her husband, Krishna Neelagiri, who pursued his MDS and worked at Kamineni Hospitals in Hyderabad, shifted to California after their wedding. Given that the laws in the US demanded that he had a degree in dentistry from the United States, it took him around one and a half years to finish his degree, helping his wife pursue her career.

This apart, even women studying after marriage, have had their husbands shift to the cities, they live in. A student of ISB, Vaishnavi Aray said, “My husband who worked at an MNC in Bengaluru, got transferred to Hyderabad for my academics. Even before my academic year started, my husband moved to Hyderabad to find us a place. After moving to ISB, we have started living on campus and my husband mostly manages to get Hyderabad-based projects.”

Though this population of husbands shifting for wives’ cause, is minor, the trend definitely seems to be working out for young couples who are less influenced by age-old traditions regarding a woman’s place in the family.