"I wouldn’t want to spend one hour a day with my child and rush off to work": Mira Rajput On Raising Daughter, Misha!

After marrying Bollywood star Shahid Kapoor in 2015, Mira Rajput, a student of Lady Shri Ram College in Delhi, has been under constant limelight. Now, the 22-year-old is cherishing every bit of motherhood: She spoke at length about her life as a wife and a young mother to daughter Misha at a Women’s Day event on Wednesday.

Saying that she doesn’t want to start working anytime soon and wishes to spend all her time with her seven-month-old daughter, Mira said, “I had a tough pregnancy. I mean I went through those five months of a difficult time to bring my daughter into this world. So, now I want to spend every moment that I can with her and I think that I am.”

She went on to say, “There is a set of responsibilities that are on my plate and I feel that at my age, I have a lot more energy. I have my future ahead of me so I can finish all of my responsibilities and then I have nothing in my way. You know I can raise my daughter, I can be a good wife, I can set my house the way I like, not in terms of the way things should be but the way a home must be with its values and ideals. So, nothing will stop me after that but I love being at home, I love being a mother to my child, I wouldn’t have it any other way. I wouldn’t want to spend one hour a day with my child and rush off to work. Why did I have her? She is not a puppy, you know. I want to be there for her as a mother, seeing her grow up has, cannot be quantified.”

Watch the interview below:

Mira also shared her thoughts on choosing arranged marriage, what empowerment means to her and finding the new wave of feminism destructive.

Below are the excerpts from the interview:

On being married to Shahid

At home, it’s just like any other marriage. We have fights, we get along well, we laugh a lot, we raise our child together, we are best of friends. When we step out, we are two people together taking on the world.

On arranged marriage

Why not (go for an arranged marriage)? You have to meet someone in some way! It worked for us so beautifully because both of us laid our cards in the open in the beginning. We were ourselves. There was a different kind of discovery after marriage but there was no negative surprise. I understood the role I had to take and he (Shahid) understood that he had to become a part of my life. Both of us have given and taken a lot from each other and we have become more wholesome. It’s two halves that make a whole.

On losing pregnancy weight

It’s great to be fit but it’s better to be a healthy mother. I went through the pressure (of body shaming) as well after Misha’s birth. But I feel you can take time to lose that weight. It’s just not about physical, but mental health as well. I took those 40 days of confinement after delivery, which people say is outdated, and I had my ghee, because I gave a lot to give birth to Misha. I loved being pampered.

On empowerment and feminism

Empowerment means you have the right to choose. So it’s my choice if I want to be at home. And it’s someone else’s choice if they want to be a working mother. But both are equally valid and neither of them should be shamed.

Feminism isn’t woman vs man. It’s about equality. A new wave of feminism has come that is aggressive... I feel it’s destructive. There’s a new term called ‘feminazi’, which is the female equivalent of a chauvinist. I think there should be harmony between the two sexes and an equilibrium.