Bleeding vaginas don’t need bleeding hearts
The CJI’s view on menstrual leave rings true. After all, aren’t we that ancient civilisation that equates the female biological system with impurity, shame?
“Mandating such leaves will lead to women being shunned from the workforce. We do not want that what we try to do to protect women can act to their disadvantage. This is actually a government policy aspect and not for the courts to look into.”
In short, leave the law out of periods. These are cautious, prescient words by Justice Chandrachud. Imagine an India in which every girl after puberty and every adult woman takes two days of leave every month because resting is the only cure for dysmenorrhea or any other discomfort during menstruation. That deep, grinding pain that sometimes arises from contractions as the uterus sloughs off unused blood linings around the organ every month isn’t something that a painkiller doesn’t take care of. That’s usually not the reason some women don’t want to go to work.
The big operating myth behind proposing menstrual leave without understanding the context and individual needs is that all women experience painful periods. They don’t. We all know women in their 40s even, who are comfortable enough to do anything during menstruation. The proposal doesn’t take into account the fact that women should have the agency and choice to broadcast to the world that she is on their period — a law that strips them of the autonomy of a simple choice.
Would having paid menstrual leave mean a fair workplace, with enough opportunities, challenging roles and promotions for women? Going by our history of gender disparity and the shame and taboo that for centuries Indian society has attached to a bleeding vagina, Chandrachud’s concerns smack of the best kind of logic.
Leave the law aside, we don’t need a monolithic legal mandate to stay away from the workplace while our bodies are performing a basic, albeit very sophisticated biological function. Doctors, policy-makers and experts are deeply divided; the argument for implementing menstrual leave has some compelling logic too.
Divya Balaji Kamekar, CEO and co-founder of Pinky Promise, an AI-enabled FemTech start-up said: “The remarks made by Hon. Justice DY Chandrachud implying that women may be disadvantaged by period leave policies, are misplaced, however well-meaning. As per an all-India study done by Maya, a women’s fertility and health tracker app, more than 47% of women suffer from debilitating pain during their periods”.
“Often this pain is as bad as a heart attack. Giving a woman some time off during these days does not impede her long-term potential as an employee but not giving her that break, in light of the pain she faces, will certainly ensure that she does not contribute as much as possible. Enabling a woman to be her productive best at work will eventually never hurt a company’s bottom line. In fact, it will only boost the bottom line because it is policies like these that attract and retain the best talent,” Kamekar said.
The judiciary isn’t buying that argument. A bench comprising Chandrachud and Justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra noted with those words why menstrual leave could be “detrimental” to women under certain circumstances. Advocate Shailendra Mani Tripathi filed a PIL in early 2023, recalling the 1961 Maternity Benefit Act that allows monthly leave at their respective workplaces during their menstrual cycle, and seeking menstrual leave for female students and working women across India.
Last year, Spain joined eight other countries that offer menstrual leave to women with a new category of sick leave that protects women experiencing incapacitating menstruation caused by a previously diagnosed pathology. She can’t self-certify and needs a doctor to certify that she qualifies for the leave.
There are reports of dissatisfaction among colleagues and employers of women who avail of menstrual leave in Zambia, introduced it in 2015. In 1953, South Korea introduced it, followed by Taiwan in 2002, Indonesia in 2003, Philippines in 2019 and Vietnam in 2020. Japan has had a similar legislation in place since 1947.
After Japan’s defeat in World War II, the country wrote period leave into its new labour laws as a right for all female employees whose periods are “especially difficult.” Media reports say that through the 1950s and 1960s, there was a relatively high take-up for this leave, but as time went on, fewer women took the option. A Japanese government survey in 2017 found that only 0.9% of female employees claimed period leave.
Closer home, Bihar introduced two days of paid menstrual leave every month in 1992 under Lalu Prasad Yadav’s government. Since 2023, Kerala has been allowing menstrual leave to students of all universities and institutions. Some companies in India have introduced menstrual leave policies including Zomato, which announced a 10-day paid period leave per year in 2020. Other companies such as Swiggy and Byjus followed in Zomato’s footsteps soon.
In India, menstruation is still hush-hush. Don’t go by the Instagram-empowered feminist period advocacy groups and their gimmicks. The neighbourhood shopkeeper still doesn’t forget to pack up your packet of Whisper pads or tampons with the most opaque of black plastic bags or a newspaper, lest the world sees that you bought something that cushions your vagina.
In several parts of India including non-rural areas and small towns, women on periods are kept away from temples, kitchens, and places and occasions considered “auspicious”.
While Delhi University mulls over whether Manusmriti should be a part of undergraduate legal studies curricula after a proposal from the university’s faculty of law, here are some provisions of the Hindu text with regard to menstruation: “The girl shall not ignore the appearance of her menstrual flow, she shall inform her relations of it, if after this, they do not give her away, they become equal to Brāhmaṇa-killers”; “For the wisdom, the energy, the strength, the sight, and the vitality of a man who approaches a woman covered with menstrual excretions, utterly perish. If he avoids her, while she is in that condition, his wisdom, energy, strength, sight, and vitality will increase”; “A Kandala, a village pig, a cock, a dog, a menstruating woman, and a eunuch must not look at the Brahmanas while they eat.”
Making menstruating women invisible, considering them “impure” or “unclean” are long-entrenched traditions in India. Women perpetuate these practices themselves in households. Given this history, a legal implication to it by introducing menstrual leave will make stereotyping and discriminating against menstruating women easier. And just because we are Indians, we of course don’t escape the universal but popular misbelief that women’s unhappiness or anger about literally anything is related to “PMS”, that she is far too emotional to handle life’s challenges assigned to men — presumably because their bodies do this monthly biological shedding.
Human empathy can best understand the demands of biology. No two women are alike, no two women’s periods are alike. The right to rest during painful, debilitating menstruation — which, of course, is not a rarity — is for a company, an organisation and a workplace leader to understand and sanction contextually.
Menstruation has never stopped women from doing anything. Often, we resist going to the office not because of an innocuous period, but because of the constant reminder that besides being a team leader or an intern, our gender, exasperatingly, is our primary qualifier.
Sanjukta Sharma is a Mumbai-based writer and behind @TheSlowFix, a wellness content platform. The views expressed are personal
