A wage for housework? India’s sweeping experiment in paying women

In a village in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, a woman receives a small but steady sum each month. This is not wages because she has no formal job. Instead, it is an unconditional cash transfer from the government.

Premila Bhalavi says the money covers medicines, vegetables and her son’s school fees. The sum, 1,500 rupees ($16: £12), may be small. However, its effects are significant. It provides predictable income, a sense of control, and a taste of independence.

Her story is increasingly common. Across India, 118 million adult women in 12 states now receive unconditional cash transfers from their governments. This makes India the site of one of the world’s largest and least-studied social-policy experiments.

Long accustomed to subsidising grain, fuel and rural jobs, India has taken a more radical step. The government is now paying adult women simply because they keep households running. These women bear the burden of unpaid care. They also form an electorate too large to ignore.

Eligibility filters vary. They include age thresholds and income caps. There are exclusions for families with government employees, taxpayers, or owners of cars or large plots of land.

“The unconditional cash transfers are a significant expansion of Indian states’ welfare regimes. They are in favor of women,” Prabha Kotiswaran, a professor of law and social justice at King’s College London, told the BBC.

How India calculates value of women’s housework

The transfers range from 1,000-2,500 rupees ($12-$30) a month – meagre sums, worth roughly 5-12% of household income, but regular. With 300 million women now holding bank accounts, transfers have become administratively simple.

Women typically spend the money on household and family needs. This includes children’s education, groceries, and cooking gas. They also cover medical and emergency expenses, retire small debts, and occasionally purchase personal items like gold or small comforts.

What sets India apart from Mexico, Brazil or Indonesia is the absence of conditions. These are countries with large conditional cash-transfer schemes. In India, the money arrives whether or not a child attends school. It is given whether or not a household falls below the poverty line.

Goa was the first state to launch an unconditional cash transfer scheme to women in 2013. The phenomenon picked up just before the pandemic in 2020, when north-eastern Assam rolled out a scheme for vulnerable women. Since then these transfers have turned into a political juggernaut.

The recent wave of unconditional cash transfers targets adult women, with some states acknowledging their unpaid domestic and care work. Tamil Nadu frames its payments as a “rights grant” while West Bengal’s scheme similarly recognises women’s unpaid contributions.

In other states, the recognition is implicit: policymakers expect women to use the transfers for household and family welfare, say experts.

This focus on women’s economic role has also shaped politics: in 2021, Tamil actor-turned-politician Kamal Haasan promised “salaries for housewives”. (His fledgling party lost.) By 2024, pledges of women-focused cash transfers helped deliver victories to political parties in Maharashtra, Jharkhand, Odisha, Haryana and Andhra Pradesh.

In the recent elections in Bihar, the political power of cash transfers was on stark display. In the weeks before polling in the country’s poorest state, the government transferred 10,000 rupees ($112; £85) to 7.5 million female bank accounts under a livelihood-generation scheme. Women voted in larger numbers than men, decisively shaping the outcome.

Critics called it blatant vote-buying. The result was clear. Women helped the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led coalition secure a landslide victory. Many believe this cash infusion was a reminder of how financial support can be used as political leverage.

Yet Bihar is only one piece of a much larger picture. Across India, unconditional cash transfers are reaching tens of millions of women on a regular basis.

Maharashtra alone promises benefits for 25 million women; Odisha’s scheme reaches 71% of its female voters.

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In some policy circles, the schemes are derided as vote-buying freebies. They also put pressure on state finances: 12 states are set to spend around $18bn on such payouts this fiscal year. A report by think-tank PRS Legislative Research notes that half of these states face revenue deficits. This occurs when a state borrows to pay regular expenses without creating assets.

But many argue they also reflect a slow recognition. India’s feminists have argued for decades about this: the economic value of unpaid domestic and care work.

Women in India spent nearly five hours a day on such work in 2024 – more than 7.6 times the time spent by men, according to the latest Time Use Survey. This lopsided burden helps explain India’s stubbornly low female labour-force participation. The cash transfers, at least, acknowledge the imbalance, experts say.

Do they work?

Evidence is still thin but instructive. A 2025 study in Maharashtra found that 30% of eligible women did not register. Sometimes this was due to documentation problems. Other times it was out of a sense of self-sufficiency. But among those who did, nearly all controlled their own bank accounts.

A 2023 survey in West Bengal found that 90% operated their accounts themselves. Additionally, 86% decided how to spend the money. Most used it for food, education and medical costs. This usage was hardly transformative. However, the regularity offered security and a sense of agency.

More detailed work by Prof Kotiswaran and colleagues shows mixed outcomes.

In Assam, most women spent the money on essentials. Many appreciated the dignity it afforded. Few linked it to recognition of unpaid work. Most would still prefer paid jobs.

In Tamil Nadu, women getting the money spoke of peace of mind. They experienced reduced marital conflict and newfound confidence. This was a rare social dividend. In Karnataka, beneficiaries reported eating better, gaining more say in household decisions and wanting higher payments.

Yet only a sliver understood the scheme as compensation for unpaid care work; messaging had not travelled. Even so, women said the money allowed them to question politicians and manage emergencies. Across studies, the majority of women had full control of the cash.

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The evidence shows that the cash transfers are tremendously useful for women to meet their own immediate needs. They also help with the needs of their households. They also restore dignity to women. These financial aids help women who are otherwise financially dependent on their husbands for every minor expense,” Prof Kotiswaran says.

Importantly, none of the surveys finds evidence that the money discourages women from seeking paid work. It also does not entrench gender roles. These are the two big feminist fears. This is according to a report by Prof Kotiswaran along with Gale Andrew and Madhusree Jana.

Nor have they reduced women’s unpaid workload, the researchers find. They do, however, strengthen financial autonomy and modestly strengthen bargaining power. They are not a panacea, nor are they poison. They are useful but limited tools. They operate in a patriarchal society where cash alone cannot undo structural inequities.

What next?

The emerging research offers clear hints.

Eligibility rules should be simplified, especially for women doing heavy unpaid care work. Transfers should remain unconditional and independent of marital status.

But messaging should emphasise women’s rights and the value of unpaid work, and financial-literacy efforts must deepen, researchers say. Cash transfers cannot substitute for employment opportunities. Many women say what they really want is work that pays. They also want respect that endures.

The transfers could disrupt the gendered division of labour. This is possible if they are coupled with messaging on the recognition of women’s unpaid work,” says Prof Kotiswaran. “This disruption might occur when paid employment opportunities become available.”

India’s quiet cash transfers revolution is still in its early chapters. It already shows that small, regular sums can be powerful. When paid directly to women, these sums can shift power in subtle, significant ways.

This could become a path to empowerment. Alternatively, it might turn into a new form of political patronage. The outcome will depend on what India chooses to build around the money.

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