Bengaluru: Recognising the role of a single male parent in the upbringing of a child, the Karnataka government announced a progressive move on Friday stating that single male government employees will be entitled to avail paternity leave with immediate effect.
Until now, such leave was applicable only to women, and henceforth, single male parents will also be eligible to get paternity leave for a maximum period of 6 months.
As per the order, ‘single male parents’ include employees who are unmarried, divorced, or are widowers tasked with the responsibility of bringing up a child single-handedly.
The government felt that the requests to allow leave for single men who were raising children were justified, the order said.
Furthermore, the order stated that the if during this leave, employees get married then the paternity leave will automatically cease to exist.
