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Stream/Area:
-
Subject:
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Paper ID:
IJSREM66238
Volume:
10 |
7 |
Jul 2026
Pages:
1-13
Publication Frequency:
Monthly (12 issues per year)
License:International Journal of Scientific Research in Engineering and Management follows the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0) License, allowing free use and distribution with proper attribution.
Institute of Social Sciences
Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar University
This paper critically examines the lived experiences of working women in Delhi and the National Capital Region (NCR) who are currently or previously involved in live-in relationships. Grounded in Feminist Standpoint Theory, Intersectionality, Symbolic Interactionism, and the Sociology of Emotions, the research employs qualitative methods, drawing upon 28 in-depth, semi-structured interviews analyzed via thematic analysis. The findings reveal that for many working women, cohabitation represents a deliberate, agentic choice to negotiate personal autonomy, reflexive intimacy, and financial independence outside the patriarchal structures of traditional arranged marriage. However, this study posits that such arrangements result in a state of "precarious autonomy." While women carve out egalitarian spaces within the private domestic sphere, they simultaneously encounter severe social stigma, housing discrimination, and extra-legal moral policing in the public domain. Furthermore, despite conditional judicial recognition, deeply marriage-centric state bureaucracies and institutions systematically marginalize non-marital families, exacerbating vulnerabilities during crises such as abandonment, intimate partner violence, or the death of a partner. These vulnerabilities are distinctly stratified along intersecting axes of class, caste, and religion. The paper concludes with structural policy recommendations urging a decoupling of basic civil rights from marital status to protect diverse formations of intimacy in contemporary India.
KEYWORDS
The gendered experience of live-in relationships in Delhi is a profound testament to the resilience, agency, and evolving consciousness of Indian working women. In the face of intense social stigma and institutional hostility, they are actively carving out unprecedented spaces for emotional truth, equitable companionship, and bodily autonomy, standing in direct defiance of centuries-old patriarchal scripts. However, their courage and pursuit of individualized freedom are currently being exploited by a systemic architecture that stubbornly refuses to grant them structural legitimacy or basic safety nets. The illusion that cohabitation inherently equates to egalitarianism is fractured by the persistent realities of feminized emotional labor, asymmetrical exit costs, and intersectional vulnerabilities shaped by caste and class. Until the everyday institutions of the state and society—from the local police station and the hospital ward to the neighborhood housing committee—are reformed to recognize and protect diverse formations of intimacy, the autonomy achieved by women in live-in relationships will remain perilous, fragile, and deeply precarious. A truly modernizing society cannot merely tolerate alternative relationships in the shadows; it must guarantee their safety and dignity in the light of the law.
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Publication Date
7/20/2026
Peer Review Type
Double-Blind Peer Review
Review Rounds: 2
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The authors declare no conflict of interest related to this research work.
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