MUMBAI: Bollywood actress Kajol reduced her film appearances out of choice when motherhood happened as she never believed in dumping off her children and going off to work. But she believes working parents have good influence on them.

“I honestly think it’s very educative for children to have working parents, and to have a working mother mostly, because that’s where the influence comes on the girl child.”

“When I was a child, I did resent sometimes that my mother went to work, and I used to tell her, ‘Mum, why can’t you be like other mothers who are at home and cooking?’ She used to be like ‘No, I have to work. I need to work’,” she recalled.

“At that point in time, maybe I felt a resentment towards her work, but when I started working, I realised that the work ethic I have, the way I work, the amount of hard work that I did was only because I had seen my mother do that all my life.

“So, hence and therefore, I feel that my daughter hopefully will understand that when she sees her mother go for work… when she grows up, she will realise that it’s important for her to work as well for her own independence and development,” said the daughter of veteran actress Tanuja.

Generally too, Kajol believes that “it’s important for women to work”.

“In whatever area they choose, women should work. And it doesn’t necessarily have to be about going out of the house and working. But the work ethic has to be understood that it’s not only a man’s job to be the breadwinner for the family. That’s where our women’s equality has to start.”