‘Why Don’t Brilliant Women Return to Work After Motherhood?’: Startup Finding Jobs for New Moms
Chennai-based Sankari Sudhar's startup 'Overqualified Housewives' has assisted over 600 Indian women in rejoining the workforce, providing job opportunities and upskilling programs for those seeking flexibility after career breaks due to marriage, childcare, or any other reason.
In a recent landmark ruling, the Supreme Court declared that two-year childcare leave — apart from maternity leave of 180 days — is a constitutional mandate for women employees.
The bench — led by Chief Justice DY Chandrachud — emphasised that denying such leave forces women to resign. “Participation of women in the workforce is not a privilege but a constitutional mandate. Child care leave subserves an important constitutional objective to make women be part of the workforce. Otherwise, mothers will be left with no option but to quit their jobs to look after their children in critical phases of their lives,” the bench noted.
However, it is not concealed that Indian women have long been burdened with the ‘motherhood penalty’.
Statistically speaking, 73 percent of Indian women leave their jobs after giving birth; 50 percent leave their jobs to take care of their children; and even among those who manage to return, 48 percent drop out within four months of rejoining the workforce. Another survey reveals that 30 percent of women report getting wage cuts after maternity breaks.
Chennai’s Sankari Sudhar went through the same agony after becoming a mother. After facing multiple rejections, she went on to start ‘Overqualified Housewives’ to get women like her back into the workforce.
So far, more than 600 Indian women have got job opportunities through her platform.
India: Home to highest overqualified housewives
A graduate of computer science engineering from Madras University of Technology, Chennai, Sankari worked for eight years before she quit her job in 2020 — after her maternity leave. “It was extremely difficult to manage my personal and professional life simultaneously. I became a homemaker assuming it would give me the required space to take care of my family and be happy. But that was not the case,” she says.
“I saw my peers getting promoted, landing better jobs, or moving abroad for higher studies. While the entire world seemed to be moving ahead, suddenly I felt stuck in the four walls of my home. I wondered why I studied well and why I was not in a position to work. These questions kept haunting me. I never expected that motherhood could bring that kind of block road for me,” she recalls.
After a career break of a year and a half, Sankari started looking for flexible work opportunities from home. “I was not in a position to work full-time for nine hours straight. I was looking for jobs that offered flexible working hours where I could work when my baby was sleeping. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find remote options for my skillset. I started upskilling myself but I was getting easy data entry kind of jobs that did not match my skill set and were not reliable,” she says.
While Sankari was on her job hunt, she came across similar stories of her friends. “One of my friends who was exceptionally brilliant told me how her life turned upside down after childbirth. I understood I was not alone. There were countless women who were unable to pursue their careers because of the lack of flexibility in the workforce for mothers,” she adds.
Quoting an article she read in a newspaper, Sankari points out that India is supposedly home to the highest number of over-educated and overqualified housewives in the world. This context is what gave birth to her startup ‘Overqualified Housewives’ — which aims to offer work flexibility and accountability to housewives looking to continue their careers, which Sankari once sought.
Helped 600 women rejoin the workforce
At Overqualified Housewives, Sankari connects mothers with companies based on their skill sets across diverse fields — including admin, operations, content writing, graphic designing, digital marketing, social media management, video editing, developing, testing, and project management.
So far, they have onboarded at least 700 Indian companies — including PickMyAd, Nowwin Technologies, Amenstra Consulting, The Social Company, and DigiNadu — on their platform.
“Women can register themselves on our platform. They can check the job opportunities we regularly post and apply for the job. We shortlist the profiles and give the database to the clients for interviews,” she says.
The platform also focuses on upskilling these mothers aiming to rejoin the workforce after long career breaks. It offers a weekly basic upskilling programme from a subject matter expert from diverse fields. The startup does not charge a penny from these mothers except Rs 199 for an hour-and-a-half upskilling session, which is not mandatory to attend.
Highlighting the challenges in running such a platform, Sankari says, “As a women-led start-up, businesses intend to take us for granted. They will quote extremely low wages assuming women will settle in for low-wage jobs. We make sure that they are paid for the level of work which they are committing,” she says.
“Also, companies believe that we may not have good professionals or committed people. We want to break that stereotype. Women are very accountable. If they take up some work, they do it with full dedication,” she adds.
Since its launch in 2022, the startup has upskilled more than 3,500 Indian women and helped over 600 of them rejoin the workforce.
One of their ‘overqualified housewives’, Meenakshi Priyadarshini tells The Better India, “After my career break of three years, when I started applying for jobs, I did not feel confident. I was not updated on the current technology. Last year, I came across this startup and registered myself. With their webinars, I started upskilling myself to the recent technology, and after six months, I landed a job that provides me with work flexibility and decent pay for my designation.”
Personally, this journey has been rewarding for Sankari, who not only found a purpose-driven career for herself but also helped women become financially independent and get back into the workforce.
“When they are welcomed into a job after career breaks, I see a whole new level of confidence among these women. It gives me a lot of peace and contentment, which is beyond the money I would make in any job or my own company,” she shares.
Edited by Pranita Bhat; All photos: Sankari Sudhar
Sources
50% of New Mothers Leave Their Jobs, and Only 27% Return: Report: By The Quint, Published on 28 April 2018
Maternity Benefits (Amendment) Act 2017: 3 years later, result far from satisfactory: By Sonal Khetarpal for Business Today, Published on 3 November 2020
A platform for women to relaunch their careers: By BLOnCampus, Published on 1 August 2017
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