Gurugram CEO says Indian parents treat sleep like a crime, sparks debate

A Gurugram-based startup CEO said Indian parents often mistake adequate sleep for laziness and poor discipline. His post triggered a wider argument online over early rising and parenting habits.Jasveer Singh, a startup co-founder, shared a detailed post about the accepted sleep schedule in Indian households. (Photo: X/@jasveer10)Sleeping until 9 am can invite lectures about laziness in many Indian households, while waking up at 5 am is often celebrated as a sign of discipline. A Gurugram-based CEO has challenged that familiar idea, arguing that sleep schedules have little to do with a person’s ambition or character.Jasveer Singh, co-founder and CEO of Knot Dating, shared a lengthy post on X questioning the Indian obsession with waking up early. His argument was simple: getting enough sleep matters more than getting out of bed at a particular hour.“Indian parents have somehow turned sleep into a character flaw and waking up early into an achievement,” Singh wrote.He pointed out how a child sleeping until 9 am may quickly be labelled “lazy”, “no discipline” or lacking ambition. But waking up at 5 am, even after barely five hours of sleep, can suddenly earn praise. “Why? What exactly did he achieve by waking up at 5 AM? Nothing,” he wrote, adding, “Waking up early is not an achievement. Sleeping properly is more important than waking up early.”Singh then turned his criticism towards what he described as a long-standing attitude towards sleep in Indian homes and schools. He recalled hearing phrases such as “Jo sota hai, woh khota hai” while growing up, along with parents opening curtains, switching on lights or deliberately making noise to wake sleeping children. “Nobody asks what time the person slept. Nobody asks whether they got enough sleep. Nobody cares about the quality of sleep. Bas subah jaldi uthna chahiye,” he wrote.He argued that adequate sleep plays an important role in concentration, memory, mood, recovery, metabolism and overall health. Singh also said that people have their own natural sleep patterns and that waking up early should not automatically be equated with discipline.See the post:His post, however, did not receive universal agreement.One user supported his argument, saying they had never considered the idea that “your body has its own sleep clock” and that a person naturally wakes up after getting enough rest.Another pushed back, arguing that the traditional advice was being viewed without context. The user said waking early was meant to go hand in hand with sleeping early, adding that getting adequate sleep should take priority when circumstances make an early bedtime difficult.Singh’s post has thus opened up a familiar debate: is waking up early genuinely a measure of discipline, or has Indian parenting simply made it one?- EndsPublished By: Srimoyee ChowdhuryPublished On: Sep 1, 2026 09:57 IST