HI SEXY - 'GATEWAY TO FUTURE' FOR INDIAN WOMEN

Another International Women's Day is here (Read my 'Is There Reason to Celebrate Women's Day in India'). My article for which I have provided the link was published in Mar 2010. This was around the time when Xinhua reported that Chinese scientists had created the world's first genetically modified cow, in Jun 2009, that can give milk rich in Omega-3 fatty acid. On the right is a picture of that cow.

But, why the moniker 'Hi Sexy', you may ask. Well, the fact is that the Chairperson of NCW (National Commission for Women) has, in a recent seminar called 'Gateway to Future', in Jaipur, has exhorted women to take it as a compliment if they are called 'sexy'. Should the genetically modified Indian woman be happy that just before IWD 2012, she is to be excited with the idea of men appreciatively calling her sexy? This should convey to her that she is 'charming and beautiful' and not an object of desire.

In a related news, Bombay High Court has also given a gift to Indian women by giving the legal sanction to retain their maiden name even after marriage. I can visualise the following situation:

There was a time when the double entendre contained in the proposition 'Aati kya Khandala?' for the 1998 Hindi movie 'Ghulam' (Slave) was a subject of heated national discussion about the vulgarity of such a proposition. Even though a boy named Aamir Khan was the slave in the movie, others were salivating about what they could do to or with a girl if she agreed to the proposition. It is only 14 years later - exactly the time taken by Lord Ram to spend time in a forest with his wife Sita and brother Laxman because a ill-tempered and ill-willed woman asked him to do so - and we already have it official that women can now be called sexy without inviting the provisions of a certain Code regarding outraging the modesy of a woman. We are making progress really.

But, I guess, it was long overdue. If a man could be called cocky for being overly self-assertive and self-confident; why can't a woman be called sexy? But, I suggest, men would be wise to restrict themselves to this one word sanctioned by Mamta Sharma, Chairperson of NCW, and not use any of the synonyms given in the thesaurus: aroused, horny, randy, ruttish, steamy, turned on(predicate), autoerotic, coquettish, flirtatious, erotic, titillating, blue, gamy, gamey, juicy, naughty, racy, risque, spicy-hot, intimate, sexual, juicy, luscious, red-hot, toothsome, voluptuous, lascivious, lewd, libidinous, lustful, lecherous, leering, lubricious, lustful, prurient, salacious, orgiastic, oversexed, highly-sexed, pornographic, adult-provocative, raunchy, sexed, sex-starved.

Conversely, if 'sexy' is to be taken as 'Charming and Beautiful', as Mamta Sharma would have us believe, imagine a boy telling his grand-mother, "Granny, even at this age you look really sexy"; and the granny sending him in outer space without the astronaut's suit and equipment.

On a serious note, yesterday, I was reading the (24th Feb 12) New York Times article by Nilanjana S Roy titled 'Homosexuality in India - A Literary History'. The last part of the article read, "In her 2010 book, 'Leaving India: My Family’s Journey From Five Villages to Five Continents' Minal Hajratwala writes: I have come to understand that queerness is a migration as momentous as any other, a journey from one world to the next … I am the only lesbian, and the only writer, in the recorded history of our clan.”

My comment on the article was: I guess, in every generation, some people would always be "different" because the majority is on the other side. For example, in Indian society, a disciplined person is looked down upon since the majority is used to living in personal and collective chaos. I might just be simplifying the bias but homosexuality is to be seen in that light; it is not the done thing as seen by the majority. The bias against it is as justified as the Christians' ealier bias against having women as helpers in the church. But, slowly, as more people supported the idea, the bastion fell. As far as 'history' is concerned, we don't have to justify our current beliefs based on the 'wisdom' of the past generations unless backwards to the future is the intention.

In the 18th century Royal Navy, since men were at sea for long durations, their women were allowed on board. They used to sleep in the hammocks; which were well suited for comfort and rest but not so well suited for Charles Darwin's 'Theory of Evolution'. The only place to practise such Theory was on the deck spaces between the ship's guns. Willy-nilly, a lot of illegitimate children were born. Such a child, if of the male sex, was callled a Son of the Gun because of his conception in the space between the ship's guns. However, two and a half centuries later, a man perks up and acts cocky when someone calls him 'Son of a Gun'.

Likewise, I am sure, after the licence given by Mamta to call women sexy, a time will come when we shall no longer read or write such articles, or call a woman so, by meaning anything other than 'charming and beautiful'.

Greetings to all my friends on the International Women's Day; especially to those who are sexy. But, then, I haven't yet come across a woman who is not charming and beautiful.