Anushka Sharma and Virat Kohli's Parenting Philosophy: A Shift from Individual to Shared Responsibility
When Bollywood actress Anushka Sharma and cricket icon Virat Kohli speak about their journey as parents, what emerges is not a narrative of dramatic emotions or grandiose declarations. Instead, their conversations reveal a thoughtful language of adjustment and recalibration that resonates with modern parenting challenges.
The Language of Adjustment and Recalibration
Both celebrities have openly acknowledged in various interviews that becoming parents fundamentally transformed how they organize their time and prioritize their commitments. Careers that once operated at full throttle now gracefully navigate around family schedules. This transformation doesn't sound like sacrifice but rather like intentional recalibration - a conscious decision that something had to shift, particularly the traditional notion that work must always come first.
During a conversation with NDTV about raising children together, Anushka Sharma explained their collaborative approach, stating, "We don't see it as mum and dad duties, but as a family responsibility... For us, it's important that our child be raised with a very balanced outlook."
Shared Responsibility Over Traditional Roles
Anushka has been particularly direct about one crucial aspect of their parenting philosophy. She emphasizes that parenting is not merely a mother's role with occasional assistance from the father, but rather a genuinely shared responsibility between both partners. In a parenting discussion featured by KidsStopPress, she elaborated on the environment they're cultivating at home, saying, "Love is the underlying factor in our home... You have to create that value structure. We don't want to raise brats."
This statement reveals their parenting priority: character development over achievement, values over performance metrics, and emotional grounding over external validation.
Presence Over Performance: Virat's Approach to Fatherhood
Virat Kohli's comments about fatherhood consistently lean toward the quality of presence rather than performative parenting. His stance becomes most visible when it comes to protecting his family's privacy. During an airport interaction covered by television news channels, he firmly addressed media personnel filming his family without permission, stating, "With my kids I need some privacy. You can't film without asking me."
This wasn't an expression of aggression but rather a clear establishment of boundaries - a crucial aspect of modern parenting in the public eye.
Intentional Boundaries and Controlled Exposure
The shared aspect of their parenting becomes particularly evident in how they manage their children's exposure to public attention. Their decision to shield their children from constant media gaze isn't about secrecy but about controlling the pace of exposure. In interviews connected to her Vogue India feature, Anushka spoke about wanting to raise her child away from unnecessary public attention and allowing natural development without social media becoming part of their identity too early.
This approach suggests something more profound than reactive parenting. They appear to be pre-deciding boundaries - consciously filtering what enters their children's lives and what remains outside. Such intentional filtering typically requires two adults working in alignment rather than one managing alone.
Values Over Image: The Core Parenting Principle
A consistent thread runs through how both parents discuss values and upbringing. Speaking again to NDTV, Anushka highlighted how conditioning shapes a child's worldview, emphasizing that respect and grounded behavior matter infinitely more than public image or external achievements. The tone in these conversations isn't preachy but rather resembles an ongoing check - a reminder that children absorb their environment faster than they internalize verbal advice.
Rejecting the Super-Parent Narrative
What's particularly noticeable is the complete absence of the super-parent narrative in their discussions. Neither presents themselves as having a perfect formula or all the answers. In a KidsStopPress featured discussion, Anushka spoke openly about learning along the parenting journey, noting that parents must be prepared for unexpected challenges rather than pretending to have everything figured out. This signals a refreshing view of parenting as an evolving process rather than something to be mastered.
Team Parenting: Division of Awareness
For countless families today, the parenting challenge extends beyond raising children to managing the world around them - the constant flow of information, visibility pressures, social comparisons, and relentless pace. Attempting this alone can become overwhelming, but approaching it as a shared mental task distributes the responsibility more sustainably.
In this context, Anushka and Virat's version of team parenting reads less like a division of labor and more like a division of awareness. It involves two adults paying attention not just to the children's immediate needs but also to the broader environment shaping them - the media landscape, social pressures, and cultural influences that modern children navigate.
A Quiet Shift in Parenting Paradigms
Their approach isn't presented as revolutionary or flashy, but it reflects a significant shift that many contemporary parents are quietly making: moving from individual endurance to shared responsibility, from reactive parenting to intentional boundary-setting, and from achievement-focused upbringing to value-centered development.
As public figures with massive influence, Anushka Sharma and Virat Kohli's parenting conversations offer more than celebrity insights - they provide a relatable framework for modern families navigating the complex terrain of raising children in today's hyper-connected, fast-paced world while maintaining balance, privacy, and shared responsibility at the core of family life.
