Happy Mother's Day: Corporates roll out benefits for new mothers

New Delhi: Various organisations in the country are now extending additional benefits to working mothers to ease getting back to work after pregnancy and help them establish a work-life balance and that includes women who opt for adoption and surrogacy options to raise children.

From adoption to surrogacy, companies have been giving leverage to mothers by allowing them to work from home, additional leave during adoption and surrogacy along with maternity leave which is common to all organisations.

For example, Coca-Cola India provides a 15-day leave period for adoption to the mothers who want to adopt a child. Similarly, in Airtel, women employees can avail 12 weeks of leave and if the age of the child is within two years then the leave would be six weeks.

To support an adoptive parent, 36 days of paid leave each year is available for women employees and single fathers at ICICI bank.

In a unique initiative, PNB MetLife grants four weeks of leave as maternity benefit to women employees opting for surrogacy with the same benefit for adoption. The company also gives a recovery period for an unfortunate incident of miscarriage during pregnancy.

"Motherhood is one of the most sensitive stages in a woman's lifecycle and our maternity policy allows 12 weeks of leave with an option to increase it by clubbing sick leave, earned leave or casual leave with it. New mothers can avail an additional one month leave with pay in case of any complications during delivery.

"Our women employees going in for surrogacy or adoption can avail of 4 weeks of leave as a maternity benefit. In the unfortunate event of a miscarriage, a 6-week leave can be availed," says Tim Braswell, Director HR, PNB MetLife.

To manage 'tiresome' toddlers companies have come up with creches that would not only help the mothers keep an eye on their children but also give children an opportunity to meet others in their age group.