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Sex and relationships
This Week in AsiaPeople

Across Asia, a new class of childless-by-choice couples emerges: meet the DINKs

  • From India to Singapore and Malaysia to Dubai, more couples across Asia are making the choice to be ‘Double Income, No Kids’
  • Their reasons vary – and it’s not always because of finances. But societal stigma persists, even in a world that’s increasingly overpopulated

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The DINK lifestyle choice has gained popularity in Asia in recent years. Photo: Shutterstock
Amy Sood

Seema was 14 when she first decided she did not want to have children. At the time, her mother laughed it off as a childish fancy, telling Seema she would one day change her mind.

But nearly 20 years later, the 34-year-old financial analyst in New Delhi has not wavered on her stance – deeply straining her relationship with her parents.

“They have not spoken to me in almost three years,” Seema said, asking to use only her first name to protect her identity. “I don’t know if they will ever come around to my decision.”

Seema and her husband refer to themselves as a DINK couple – an acronym for “double income, no kids”.

Although the term dates back decades, the DINK lifestyle choice has only gained popularity in Asia recently. And it’s seen in many quarters as highly controversial – given much of the region’s conservative, family-centric cultural values – with couples who choose to remain childless often accused of being selfish at a time when countries across the region from China to Japan and South Korea to Singapore are battling rock-bottom birth rates.

Seema met her husband Rajiv while they were both studying at university. The couple were surprised to find that they shared similar views on not wanting to have children. They’ve now been married for six years.

“I was shocked to find someone who felt the same way as me about no kids,” Seema said. “Especially because in our culture, the norm is nuclear families – a mother, a father and children … and anything that deviates from that is looked down upon.”

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