The Sex Files

Her fingers move across the smartphone with evident intensity, scrolling through the multiple videos that have popped up after she typed in 'erotic couplings'. They are lying side by side in his paying guest accommodation in Pune and the internet on her phone allows her uninterrupted access to a world that is at once exciting and overwhelming. Every now and then, the girl can't help but giggle as images of men with penises the length of her arm flash past. It makes the young man nervous, as he sheepishly tells her-"These men are not the norm, you know." The couple, in their early 20s, are eager to experiment and seeking inspiration from the porn videos on their phone screen. Even as they are sex-surfing, someone solicits them on a chat window.

The internet and the mobile phone have irrevocably changed the Indian sexscape. There is no sexual fantasy that has been left to the imagination-if it's in your mind, then it will definitely be on the internet. And easily accessible too, given the increased internet penetration. It has made the Indian bedroom-urban as well as rural-an exciting place. You can know all you want to know about sex in one swipe of the screen, in the privacy of your own bedroom, rather than furtively rifle through the well-worn pages of a porn magazine, a steamy novel or movie. Google has become the new mentor and guide.

The India Today Sex Survey has been mapping the sexual attitudes of Indians for the past 17 years. We seem to have come a long way in this time, in terms of shedding our moral inhibitions, being more open about our sexuality,

Parts of the country have now become more sex-forward, as the average age at which one has his or her first sexual encounter has come down. In Guwahati, for instance, 61 per cent of the respondents said they had their first sexual encounter in their teens, which was the highest among all cities surveyed. Today, 33 per cent of the respondents claim they had their first sexual experience in their teenage years. It is a far cry from the results of our first sex survey in 2003, when 8 per cent respondents said they had their first sexual encounter before they turned 18. Increased exposure to the web, wider acceptance of one's sexuality and the perceived convenience of the morning-after pill perhaps has led to this early sexual start.

This year, in addition to the regular set of questions assessing changing sexual behaviour and attitudes, we introduced several new questions that tapped people's fantasies, attitudes to fidelity and extramarital sex, pornography and the use of performance-enhancers like Viagra.

More than three-fourths of the respondents said they watched porn regularly or occasionally-85 per cent of the male respondents said they did so; 48 per cent men also admitted to having paid sex while only 3 per cent of women respondents admitted to doing the same. Despite this, a majority of the respondents-89 per cent-were against filming themselves or taking pictures while having sex; 74.4 per cent were also closed to the idea of threesomes. This either reflects wariness with experimentation or a reluctance on the part of the respondents to share their darkest fantasies with those surveying them. In a similar vein, 64.4 per cent were not open to going to a strip club or a swinger's club with their partners, and 57 per cent were not open to any kind of S&M activity in the name of experimentation. While those in the 14-29 age group were definitely more liberal when it came to questions that involved role play, threesomes, spanking or biting their partners, or using dildos, vibrators etc, the percentage difference was negligible.

In August 2018, the Supreme Court issued a historic ruling confirming the right of the LGBT community to express their sexuality without discrimination. According to Solene Paillet of Gleeden, the first global extramarital dating website that has close to 200,000 women members in India, "The website has witnessed more than a 45 per cent increase in same-sex encounters during the past six months, meaning that after the abolition of Section 377, people feel freer to practise their sexual preference and to pursue homosexual or bisexual encounters outside their marriages." The India Today Sex Survey, however, reveals that most Indians are still reluctant to own their sexuality and prefer a sanitised version of it, one that doesn't make them uncomfortable. When asked about their sexual orientation, 9 out of 10 respondents said they have sex only with persons of the opposite gender. Patna was the only city (of the 19 surveyed) where only 58 per cent said they had straight sex.

A month after its landmark ruling on homosexuality, in September 2018, the apex court struck down another colonial-era law linked to adultery, ruling that extramarital sex was no longer a criminal offence in India.

Yet, as Paillet says, "Despite decriminalisation of extramarital sex, there's still very strong social stigma regarding female infidelity in India. For this reason, men outnumber women on the dating site even when technology makes infidelity very easy, discrete and accessible to women. Most Indian women continue to believe infidelity is something terrible and punishable."

This, when Indian women, in the past decade, especially in urban India, have come into their own, gained financial independence, made strides professionally, taken patriarchy and misogyny head-on, a wave of feminism that has also bred a liberal attitude towards sex. But even as most women are no longer afraid to seek pleasure as equals, they are also scared of being judged.

The past year was also one in which #metoo cast its long shadow. It dominated the headlines and was the focus of our sex survey, which explored the idea of exploitation and sex at work.

Crimes against women have been on the rise over the past decade-per the most recent National Crime Records Bureau data, crimes against women increased by 26 per cent in 2016. As a result, we finally saw the first National Register of Sex Offenders launched by the government in an effort to stem crimes against women.

Social media apps are also making the web a messy, unwieldy space where paedophiles have easy access, and cyber-blackmailing, sextortion and revenge pornography are growing. While the Indian government is blocking major porn sites, 'mirror sites' are appearing with lightning speed. The dark, vicious side of the internet remains a black hole that is largely unregulated. According to cyber security specialist Ritesh Bhatia, "Social networking sites, dating portals and smartphone apps massively contribute towards crimes such as sextortion and cyber stalking. The lack of awareness of the dangerous effects of smartphone applications and tech-based capabilities is one of the topmost reasons why individuals become victims of cyber crimes."

Rise in crime apart, porn addiction is also breeding sexual insecurity and causing strife in relationships. "Porn addiction is definitely rampant today," says Sadia Saleed, founder and chief psychologist at Inner Space Counselling, Mumbai. "An overdose of porn can distort reality. People feel it is easier to get pleasure than actually getting down to having sex which can be tedious after a hard day's work. People want instant gratification and porn gives them that."

Talking of how the internet has changed sexual attitudes, Saleed says, "The internet creates awareness and one of the biggest changes we have witnessed is the rise in self-referred patients who come to us to discuss intimacy issues. This is a huge shift in trajectory from how things were 18-20 years ago. The younger lot, between 22 and 45, is not afraid of seeking help."

However, the more things have changed in the Indian sexual arena, the more they have also remained the same. In their larger sexual attitudes, men remain trapped in the past, as the results of our survey show. To the question-'Is virginity important to you'-53 per cent respondents (both men and women) said yes. The number was much higher in smaller cities such as Ahmedabad and Jaipur, at 82 per cent and 81 per cent, respectively. In response to the same question in 2004, 72 per cent men said they expected their brides to be virgins. We also remain a nation that favours the missionary position-42 per cent women and 38 per cent men rated this as their favourite sexual position in this year's survey. This is only down 9 percentage points from 2003.

But things are more exciting in India's smaller towns and cities. Data collected this year seems to suggest people here are far more open about their sexual behaviour, are not averse to experimentation and have a healthier attitude to sex. Indore, Bhubaneswar, Guwahati and Chandigarh lead the way in liberal sexual attitudes. Experts believe this is because there is less value judgement in these places and the lives less complicated.

The bottom line, of course, is whether or not people are satisfied with their sex lives. And 62 per cent of men and 58 per cent women surveyed this year say they are. It's a different matter that being a duplicitous society, and afraid of being judged by either stories of too little or too much sex, so we tailor our stories depending on the company at hand.

Methodology

The India Today Sex Survey, 2019 was carried out by Marketing and Development Research Associates or MDRA, New Delhi, in 19 cities. The field survey was conducted among 4,028 people between January 23 and February 20, 2019. Male and female respondents were interviewed in equal numbers, and in three age groups: 14-29, 30-49, 50-69; special consent was taken to interview those under 18. The respondents could be married or single, having sex inside marriage or outside it, and had to have a minimum education of HSC.

Like in 2018, the annual survey was conducted in two parts. The first dealt with questions on the ways we make love and how open we are to experimentation. The second had regular questions on sexual behaviour, attitudes and preferences of the urban population in key cities of the country.

The respondents were selected randomly to eliminate bias. The agency used its unique 3 'S'-size, spread and selection-method to select the sample and multistage sampling. In the first stage, any major factors that could cause sampling errors were controlled through an appropriate selection process (among males, females, geographical distribution etc.). At the second stage, the contact points with the respondents were a mix of places of aggregation.

Male and female respondents were approached by same gender investigators. Experien­ced and trained MDRA investigators approached respondents with a structured questionnaire. Respondents were asked to drop the completely filled-in questionnaires into a sealed drop box to ensure anonymity of responses.