Give Them Hope and Give Them Comfort Because They're Running Out of Time

Indians are developing smaller, more nuclear families, and patriarchs and matriachs are less and less welcome in the home. Parliament's solution: Jail kids for three months if they don't take care of their folks.

The new law, which provides for the setting up of many tribunals to provide speedy help to the old in distress, contains no room for appeal.

"This has been done deliberately as they (the children) have a lot of resources which the old people do not have," Kumar said.

The legislation also provides for the state to set up old age homes that the minister said should be the "last resort for the poor and the childless."

The bill applies to adult children with parents over the age of 60.

Legislators lamented the need for the legislation.

"Things have come to such a pass now that the old have to petition the government for care and help. What kind of a life is that?" said Gyan Prakash Pilania, a member of the opposition Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party.

This is the situation Mark Steyn and Stanley Kurtz et al worry about, although they mostly write about the West, where this has been the norm for generations. And Kurtz blames the welfare state for encouraging and enabling smaller families, yuppies delaying their first child 'til their 10th anniversary, etc—behavior that leads to a smaller and smaller tax base to pay for the aged. Discussions about this stuff aren't going to happen in the U.S., but I'd guess there are ears for it in India.

Headline explained here.