Why sex is a tabooed word in India: In search of women who can qualify as ‘Adarsh Bharatiya Nari’

One of the most heart-breaking interviews I conducted, while researching for my ambitious work of non-fiction, Status Single was meeting a soon-to-be ‘settled down,’ marketing professional belonging to a conservative village in Haryana. The oldest of two sisters – she had revolted against marrying immediately after college and insisted on an MBA in a ‘big city,’ and the freedom of opportunities it offered. Including, life in a PG, followed, by a job in a NCR-based multinational. A small, rented pad in South Delhi, overlooking an ancient mausoleum. Relationships flowered – a more stable, live-in holding the promise of marriage to a ‘modern, cosmopolitan man, also, an MBA, working in the same office,’ which led naturally to ‘premarital sex,’ ending sadly, with the man not amassing the moral courage to retaliate against his family.

His mother was livid that he could be in a ‘relationship,’ and soon commanded him to an arranged alliance within the ‘biradri (community)’. The couple were from different communities and castes. The girl was shattered – and before she knew it, her own family swooped down, threatening to enrol her for the proverbial ‘ladka dekhna (checking out prospectives)’ jamboree, claiming she’d been granted enough ‘azaadi (freedom).’

It was abundantly clear that if she didn’t toe the line, her younger sister, wouldn’t be allowed to pursue her further studies. The girl in question was petrified of her earlier affair being discovered during the match making and decided to break a fixed deposit to put herself through hymen reconstruction/ hymenoplasty/re-virgination in a popular city clinic – a popular cosmetic surgery that restores the torn hymen.

‘Waise bhi, saher ki ladki ko log randi hi mante hain…jeans pehne wali…akeli rehne wali…late night office cab mein ghar aane wali… shaadi se pehle sex ki bhukhi types…strong aurat bhi ek kisam ka samjhota hain…sach mein sabh ko sanskaari beti aur biwi aur bahu chahiye (as it is, city girls are considered whores, those who wear jeans, stay alone, return late night from work by cabs…sex depraved types…strong woman is also one sort of compromise, the truth is everyone wants a morally righteous daughter, wife and daughter-in-law)’….

I shall never forget her still eyes. Her moist, dense eyelashes.

In 2020, there was a deafening uproar over reports of fake virginity products being sold on Amazon India that ultimately resulted in the e-tail giant taking down the merchandise. Till today there are newer variants of these synthetic, blood-containing, self-dissolving cellulose capsules which are still being peddled on websites of Indian pharmaceutical companies catering to the demand and pressure arising from a woman’s marriage – accompanied by the morally sanctimonious need for the bride to be a virgin – a regressive and reprehensible factor that is openly advertised in leading national and regional dailies.

This in a nation where despite stringent laws against child labour and prostitution, approximately 5,000 people are trafficked annually. In 2018, Jharkhand had the highest number of cases of trafficking, with Maharashtra ranked second. An expose by online news portal The Print revealed that young women could be purchased for the equivalent of as little as $415 in Jharkhand through monthly instalments. “Healthy goats” cost twice as much in the farm-dependent state, the same piece, scathingly added. The ILO estimates trafficking to be a $150 billion industry, with children constituting a majority of the victims. Clients in red light areas label having sex with an underage virgin ‘nath utarna (removal of the nose ring).’ A term popularised by Bollywood films.

This in a nation ranked amongst 150 countries globally where marital rape is not recognised by law. The Delhi High Court, on 11 May, 2022, witnessed a split decision on the constitutionality of the marital rape exception. Justice Rajiv Shakdher stated that Exception 2 to Section 375 (which prescribes the marital rape exception) is “violative of Articles 14, 15, 21 of the Constitution and hence must be struck down.”

However, Justice C Hari Shankar, the other judge on the division bench, disagreed and counter argued that there were no grounds for the court to strike the exception down, which was justified under Article 14, as there was an intelligible differentia created by marriage. This exception has been part of the IPC, since its inception in 1860, justified by Lord Macaulay in his original draft of the criminal law in 1839 as an exception necessary to protect the “conjugal rights” of a husband. The concept of ‘coverture’ was further elucidated from the 1600s, Sir Matthew Hale – who had justified that upon marriage, a woman surrendered her agency to her husband, including, when it came to consent for sexual intercourse.

While the government and the courts still pussyfoot around this misogynistic strangulation of a woman’s sexual autonomy  — one in every three women, between the ages of 15 and 49, have come on record to share that they had experienced some form of violence from their spouses, as per the latest NHFS data. Nearly 80 per cent of women confessed that their current husband as perpetrators and 9 per cent reported their former husbands as perpetrators.

On Monday, the Supreme Court officially prohibited “Two-Finger Test” in rape cases and warned that persons conducting such tests will be held guilty of misconduct. The bench, directing the Union Health Ministry to ensure that survivors of sexual assault and rape are not subjected to the test, upheld: “This court has time and again deprecated the use of two finger-test in cases alleging rape and sexual assault. The so called test has no scientific basis. It instead re-victimises and re-traumatises women. The two finger test must not be conducted… The test is based on an incorrect assumption that a sexually active woman cannot be raped. Nothing can be further from the truth.”

Here’s what truly messes with my head.

Why this association of purity/pavitrata with a woman’s privates? Why sex is portrayed as sinful and rationalised by religion – menstruating women not allowed to enter a temple’s sanctum sanctorum or even so much as step inside the kitchen? Why this hush hush and hullabaloo over mahiney ke unn dino mein (days of the month) – when there is no scientific proof whatsoever that sex is any less enjoyable when a woman has her period.

Also, point to be considered – enjoyable for whom?

Is sex, ever meant to be a pleasure receiving act for my sex – where I am more than a mute giver – an object of male lust and fantasy and a hedonistic competitive chase, that is almost always, strictly on their terms and turf.

Ever asked, if it is man’s world, even between our legs?

So much written, said and portrayed in popular culture about women turning off men saying, ‘mood nahin hain,’ but almost nothing on the deep sexual unfulfillment and resultant emotional loneliness in women, expected to soothe their carnal desires by procreating and being dutiful in her performance of domestic responsibilities. No one senses how alone or humiliating she feels when she has to literally seduce her man for his attention and physical attention and touch. The Lakshman Rekha being modern day, existential crises, like ‘stress,’ ‘work load,’ ‘too tired, tonight.’

All of which can and should be true. Except, these are life conditions that are gender agnostic. That should be.

Ever heard of a man being called ‘frigid.’

No, right?

Because, it is the birth right of men to be ‘horny,’ ‘have needs,’ want to ‘sow his wild oats.’

Women – conceding. Consenting. Cohabiting. Conceiving.

Ever wondered if this is the same matribhoomi (motherland) where according to Apastamba Grhyasutra, an ancient Hindu literary text, Gandharva Vivaha flourished as a type of marriage where the woman chooses her own partner who meet each other of their own accord, consent to live together, their relationship consummated in copulation born of passion. This form of marriage not based on permission of parents or anyone else. According to Vedic texts, this is one of earliest and common forms of marriage in the Rig Vedic time. A passage in the Atharvaveda suggests that parents usually left the daughter free in selection of her lover and directly encouraged her in being forward in love-affairs. The mother of the girl thought of the time when the daughter was of age (Pativedanam, post-puberty), that she would win a husband for herself.

Hark back to Kalidasa’s magnum opus, Abhigyanam Shakuntalam.

I am all in support of the pathbreaking Supreme Court ruling – but as I write this, I think, why then the convenient double standards on marital rape? Why we don’t flinch an eyelid when worshipping the Kumaari version of the Mother Goddess – knowing fully well, that on the fringes of what constitutes the bhadrolok (genteel) samaj (society) – the National Human Rights Commission estimates 40,000 children abducted annually, in India, leaving 11,000 untraced.

Why leading newspapers mint money off matrimonial ads that literally peddle women as commodities, pimping us against a marketing rate card – because marriage is the ultimate money churner – and, hardly, about saath janmo ka saath and we know the rest of the hogwash, there is.

Why the Congress government was so threatened by an Internet cartoon character, Savita Bhabhi and chose to ban the same – when box-office ticket sales skyrocket with sleazy item songs that routinely objectify a woman’s body and peddle us as inanimate sex objects?

Because, Bhabhi toh Ma hoti hain…. (sister-in-law is a mother).

Says whom?

Why this glorification of motherhood – asexualizing women and casting her into yet another role. Even as men get away with complaining how the woman post pregnancy, either become a ‘moti bhais,’ or, are preoccupied with child-rearing!

Why even veteran director Raj Kapoor popularised the phrase in his 1985 super-hit, ‘Ram Teri Ganga Maili…’

Dirty, why?

Sex before marriage?

Pregnant with child and no legal husband/bacche ka baap?

Sold to a brothel?

A mother openly breastfeeding her newborn?

Who is the audience, exactly?

Ask yourself.

If you know the answer.

Stand up.

Decide which Adarsh Bharatiya naari can you be?

There is….