What did the Supreme Court say about paid maternity leave?

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The story so far: Last week, the Supreme Court ruled that adoptive mothers can take 12 weeks of paid maternity leave regardless of the age of their children at the time of adoption. Repealing Section 60(4) of the Social Security Code 2020 (formerly Section 5(4) of the Maternity Benefit Act 1961), which limited this benefit only to mothers who adopted children under the age of three months, the Court stated that the adoptive mother has the same rights and obligations towards the child as the biological mother.

What is the Maternity Leave Law in India?

Statutory maternity benefits for working women in India began in colonial times. The Bombay Maternity Benefit Act of 1929 applied to female factory workers. Similar laws followed in other parts of the country in the pre-independence period. In 1961, Parliament passed the Maternity Benefit Act, providing 12 weeks of paid maternity leave to working women across the country.

In 2017, the Maternity Benefits (Amendment) Act not only extended the period of paid maternity leave for biological mothers to 26 weeks, but also inserted a provision extending maternity leave to adoptive or surrogate mothers for the first time. Section 5, paragraph 4 of the Act stated that a surrogate or adoptive mother who legally adopts a child within three months is entitled to maternity leave for a period of 12 weeks from the day the child is handed over to the mother.

Why was this law considered insufficient?

Also read: What legal protection is there for women returning from maternity leave?

This provision was challenged in 2021 by Hamsaanandini Nanduri, a lawyer who adopted the siblings in 2017. Ms Nanduri told The Hindu that her Bengaluru-based law firm had given her only six weeks of paid maternity leave. “I couldn’t leave my young children at home to start the office after just six weeks, so I took a few more months of unpaid leave. But I was angry that there was no policy for that,” she said.

When the petitioner ended the 12 weeks of maternity leave granted in 2017 to adoptive or surrogate mothers as “mere lip service”, it said that compared to the 26 weeks of maternity leave granted to biological mothers, it violated the provisions of the fundamental right guaranteed by the Constitution.

The three-month limit was unfair to both children and parents, as it deprived older adoptees of the maternal care they need for their development and integration into adoptive families, her lawyer argued.

The petitioner also pointed out in court that adoption procedures in India take much more than three months.

Also, as Ms. Nanduri told The Hindu: “On filing an RTI (Right to Information) application with CARA (Central Adoption Resource Authority), that less than 5% of the children adopted at that time were under three months of age.”

What did the Court say about maternity?

The court made it clear that motherhood cannot be viewed only through the “narrow lens of biology.” He referred to adoption as part of the “right to reproductive autonomy”. It noted that “vacation time plays a key role in forming (the) emotional bond between mother and child”. The court added that levels of stress hormones in children raised in orphanages are often higher than those raised in family settings, pointing to a greater need for paid maternity leave for older adopted children.

How will the ruling help adoptees and their parents?

Madhumitha Venkataraman began interviews for a job as a senior HR manager while waiting for an adoption recommendation, specifying in each interview that she would need paid time off to support her child. Several multinational organizations were reluctant to grant leave for more than a few weeks. But Ms. Venkataraman was eventually hired by a global media company that promised her one year of paid maternity leave. “My son came home aged three-and-a-half months in 2023, so I wasn’t entitled to maternity leave under the old law. But because this company was so supportive, I didn’t have to choose between career and parenthood,” she said. “There are emotional needs, and not just for the child. Spending time at home with my son gave me the space to grow into motherhood,” she said. From now on, other adoptive mothers will also be entitled to this time and space.

Noopur Goyal’s daughter was 15 months old when she returned home in 2021. “I was working as a pediatric cardiologist in a top hospital in Delhi. I knew there was no maternity leave, so I had to give up my job,” said Dr Goyal, a single parent who works as a freelance consultant in Noida. “I brought her into a new world so I had to be there for her. An adopted child was uprooted twice. I needed time at home with her to bond and make her feel safe.” Dr. Goyal said she is financially stable to do this, but is “happy now that there is a law that mandates 12 weeks of paid maternity leave for all adoptive mothers.”

What did the court say about paternity leave?

The court also asked the Union government to examine the need for a formal law recognizing paternity leave for all fathers, adoptive or biological. He notes that the Indian legal framework does not adequately consider the role of fathers in the care of children and emphasized the importance of shared parenting. From now on, only male civil servants are entitled to 15 days of paternity leave for the birth or adoption of a child. Leave in the private sector is generally determined by company policy.

Published – 22 March 2026 03:45 IST