Parenting, a shared responsibility

Bollywood actor, Ashish Choudhary who is known for his comic roles in movies like 'Qayamat', 'Dhamaal', 'Paying Guests' and 'Double Dhamaal'shares his experiences at parenting and how he and his wife Samita Bangargi enjoy the process. He says, his life has changed after becoming father.

Ashish Choudhary says, "I think life got a meaning today to live. Earlier it was all about ourselves and the race will never end and now focus has increase I know what I am living for and I am living for the children.

You can say that my life is more evolved and has become more meaningful"

Ashish lost his sister and brother-in-law in the 26/11 tragedy. He is taking care of her sister's two kids and his three kids. He says, "I always teach my children two things, one is they should respect women and second is talk what's in your heart.

These are the basic two things which I teach my children. My responsibility as a father is to speak with my children and find out what's bothering them.

I train them to talk everything to me so that I can make them understand. And my responsibility is to give them space and be there for them. If I will play hide and seek with them, they will not touch phone or TAB because dad is playing with them."

When the child will not score good marks or do something wrong the society will blame the mother. But Ashish disagrees, "As a parent our responsibility starts when the child is in mother's womb.

A father or mother should not smoke or drink because that will pass to our child. When the child is out also, we must take care of his studies or habits. We cannot blame the mother. God has created mother and father to divide the responsibility.

My wife doesnot wake up early in the morning. I take care of all staff and send my kids to school. And during the day and in the evening, when I am at office, she takes care of them."

He also talks about the change in parenting patterns and how one has to adapt to changing times, "at the time of our forefathers, in the absence of contraceptives, kids were born without any plan.

Our parents used to have six sisters and four brothers etc. They used to have a big family. And in my parents' generation, they were planned, and the understanding was 'papa kaam karenge and mummy khana banayegy', and they have this intention of coming up with a good and great family with two kids.

And now during our generation the understanding is not just to make family, but it's about creating a great environment. It's about getting involved by indulging in parenting. I think this generation is the next level of parenting."

With growing digitisation, kids are turning into screenagers and everything is a touch away he says, "It's so amusing and the impact is so tremendous and powerful, that none of us have an idea of right and wrong.

All we know that this is new, and the kids are going to be exposed to the new medium and they are going to fight for if we do not give it to them. What we have to understand is how we can move with the time, how we can be more involved and how we can have more monitoring on what they do?"

Indian Television actor Ashish Choudhary, who was part of the Voot Kids launch in Mumbai, further adds, "Being a father of five kids is not easy.

Making sure that they stay entertained while learning a thing or two becomes difficult. An app like this, enables us parents to monitor the kind of content, the screen time and viewing habits for our children without losing the fun element.

That's where VOOT Kids stands out as a category first app. I am super happy to be associated with this revolutionary platform, which provides engaging and relevant content across categories."