No Sex please, we are Indians!
The nation delights to songs like “Main aayi hoon UP Bihar lootne”, BJP MLAs were once caught surfing porn in the Karnataka assembly (http://www.deccanherald.com/content/225344/karnataka-minister-caught-watching-porn.html). Indian porn consumption is so high that India ranks at number 3 in ‘Android traffic’ to Pornhub after the US and UK.
Porn star Sunny Leone is respected as a Bollywood actor and colorfully pornographic insults dot our daily dialog in every walk of life. Yet in an ‘oh-so-righteous’ fit of guarding ‘morality’, the government tried to ban porn, only to draw back later after many Indians justifiably voiced their need to watch films like My Bare Lady(TV Series,2006).
When it comes to porn, Indians are chanting “Yeh dil maange more”. As Swaminathan Aiyar writes, songs like ‘Jumma chumma de de’ are musical illustrations of harassment and stalking. Oh yes, “Eve teasing” is a semi-pornographic art form in Hindi cinema. Villain Ranjeet’s rape scenes (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjhPsXRxrBw) were so popular that audiences cheered when he performed them. Blue film parlours boom in cities. Yet on the issue of porn we inhabit the “State of Double standards” or shall I say Hypocrisy!
We enthusiastically watch the semi-nude Mandakini romping in a ‘wet sari.’ Holi songs are picturised through wet spinning & twisting to rather morally ‘slippery’ lyrics. Jhatkas and matkas of 36–24–36 figures mark our festive occasions and videos of Silk Smithaa ( The Dirty picture) are viral on social media. In our country we are certainly not porn free!! Song sequences, especially in South Indian movies have transformed from the 1960s kiss timidly ending in a profusion of flowers to sado-masochism set to a wild orchestra. For us it’s not Fifty Shades of Grey, but all blue.
As far as porn is concerned, “hamaam mein sab nange hain.”
Cracking down on crimes related to child porn, exploitation of women or the evil of trafficking is urgent, but censoring the rights of adults to consume material of their choice would mean — to quote an internet joke doing the rounds at the moment — not only failing to bring “achche din”, but also banning “achchi raat”.
The government needs to catch criminals, not restrict freedom in the process. We may think our society is a Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham-style family soap opera but the Indian ‘Bhabhi’ in desi porn is shown celebrating Maha Shiv Ratri in very different ways than in a saas bahu serial. Banning porn is “naked hypocrisy” in a country where we Indians are singing ‘choli ke peeche kya hai’.
Maanushi Rana
