Real empowerment demands more than hashtags—it requires urgent action to tackle biases, share responsibilities, and invest in their potential.

Why do we celebrate women’s empowerment with hashtags and slogans while ignoring the harsh reality? Women continue to bear the brunt of unpaid care work, struggle to step into the workforce, lack financial literacy, and face constant undervaluation of their contributions. How long will men and women alike tolerate this systemic failure that suppresses half the nation’s potential? Despite decades of empty rhetoric and symbolic milestones, India remains trapped in a cycle of shallow gestures, avoiding the complete societal overhaul needed for true empowerment.

Women in India, whether in rural villages or urban sprawls, are overworked and undervalued. The disproportionate burden of unpaid care work is one of the greatest barriers to women’s workforce participation. Cooking, cleaning, child-rearing, and elder care are seen as intrinsic to a woman’s role, rather than as essential services deserving recognition or compensation.

Indian men are yet to fully share household responsibilities. According to the NSSO’s Time Use Survey (2019), women in India spend nearly five hours daily on unpaid care work—three times more than men. This imbalance is not unique to India; globally, the so-called “care........

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