Public Display of Affection in India

Last week I along with two of my colleague went for lunch. Happily chatting within us we went inside a decent restaurant, and quickly gave our order. Meanwhile we were talking about our office work; suddenly my friend who was sitting opposite to us said, look behind you what is happening? I said, what happened? He said there is guy and a girl who are sitting behind you and they are kissing. I said what happened in that; they must be husband and wife or lovers. Let them do whatever they want. On this my dear friend said that no this is not good, if they want to love each other then they should do it inside their house. 

At that moment I was not able to think, what the problem in PDA is. With their act they were not creating any problem for the society in fact I said this to my friend and even pointed that you smoke and create problem for the society but till now have anyone walked to you and complained about it. Then why you are creating so much noise about PDA.

Friends I am very much sorry, may be some of you must be wondering what is PDA. PDA is public display of affection. If anyone wants to give definition to PDA then he can say that PDA is an act of physical intimacy in the view of others. In most of the countries PDA is not an issue of concern, because it is common in those countries. But in India if anyone caught you even holding hands of opposite gender (no matter you are married or unmarried), hugging or otherwise showing affection in public then they are talked abruptly with non-decent language. Here and there we keep on hearing about police and self appointed guardians of the society terrorizing those who dare to ‘indulge’ in such PDA. Now that 14th February (Valentine’s Day) is near you will hear lots of such incidences. I got to thinking why this happens in India. 

Don’t in India we want to love each other, or we see Love as a bad thing which should be done only behind the closed doors? I can’t understand how a wall or door can change the meaning of some act, In India behind the closed door if you kiss someone then it is called as love, and the same kiss becomes indecent if the door is open.

Somewhere I read that we are not carrying Indian values, instead we are embracing Victorian values. During the reign of Queen Victoria, showing leg was very much objectionable; it was objectionable to the point that even legs of tables were also required to be covered by tablecloths. Victorians brought this mindset to India which we still embrace. With time Britishers changed their mindset, but we Indians continue to cling to that hypocrisy. 

The so called guardians of our society say that kissing or hugging in public is a western concept. I think those people have not seen the temples of Khajuraho, or they don’t know how Rambha tried to disturb the penance of Rishi Vishwamitra, or they don’t know that in Kama sutra also references were made about kissing. I don’t know how much this is true but in one of the website (www.indiadivine.org) even it is mentioned that “When Alexander the Great's army conquered parts of northern India in
326 B.C., they learned about kissing. 

But somehow along the way, we Indians started feeling uncomfortable talking about intimacy. Here it is ok to hold hand or hug friends of the same gender. But if the same thing is done between friends of opposite gender then that is shocking or unacceptable. In what kind of hippocratic society we are living. Oh yes I forgot to mention, now even holding or hugging friends of the same gender is a crime in India. If people will catch you doing so in public and if they will say that you guys are homosexuals then the next moment you will be in jail. Anyway I am not here to talk about homosexuality. 

As a country with the second largest population in the world, Indians are obviously having a lot of action in bed. But talk about it? Acknowledge it? Oh No! How can we? We are Indian!

But now the scene is changing, we see more couples walking hand in hand, or hugging each other and occasionally they even kiss in public also. This is because, the younger generation is accepting the concept of PDA, I don’t know how but may be because our society is changing and now we see more women walking in public with us, so the male female contact is more compared to earlier time. Apart from this there can be several other reasons such as our Bollywood movies, the TV soaps. Moreover people have a tendency to do what they are asked not to do, which is also changing our society.

So I thing that public display of affection is ok with us. What is your opinion PDA is Indian or un-Indian? I am scared if after reading this article, self proclaimed social police will come and throw stone to my house.

Image Source:-

http://www.newtimes.co.rw/news/index.php?i=14149&a=25115