Schoolkids and youngsters are taking biology lessons outside the classroom, beyond the monitoring gaze of parents and teachers, discovers Biswadip Mitra

At one dimly-lit corner of a buzzing café on FC Road, a girl gently presses the private part of her friend. He then presses her thigh and moves his hand all over her. This couple is oblivious to the fact that I am watching them, between sipping my coffee and pretending to read a newspaper. Their school uniforms have caught my attention.

Over the days, as I do the rounds of public spaces, I witness more such acts of sensual pleasures. There is nothing new in that, except to see much younger people exploring the world of physical intimacy, rather openly. It is not just the pillion-riding girl who tightly hugs her guy on the bike and kisses his neck at every traffic signal. That is dated PDA. Today’s teenagers know which condom suits them better and which pill won’t cause trouble. The age of sexual experience seems to have gone down.

So, what do the youngsters think about this? Delhi-based mediaperson Neelabh, a young man in his mid 20s, thinks “pre-marital sex is not wrong, if the two people are committed to each other.” He, however, thinks it is wrong to indulge in sex during teenage. A young Afsana in Pune doesn’t approve of pre-marital or teenage sex. “I shall not go for it, unless I get married. There must be some restriction on our behaviour,” she says, though she isn’t judgemental about young people — including many of her friends — who indulge in pre-marital sex.

Eighteen-year-old Ajay “cannot imagine how can one claim to be a ‘mature person’ without having experienced sex.” He shares a bit of backgrounder: “Every guy in my class in the school was doing it. So I also did it with a girl in my school two years back. I do it regularly now, and the girls enjoy it,” he informs candidly.

But despite the ‘maturity’, Ajay doesn’t look at me directly; he gazes at the menu card of the eatery on SB Road as he divulges his secrets: how he procured the first set of condoms using a decoy, what he says to his parents after returning late from a ‘study group’ that covers up for his sex sojourns, and how he approaches the “hot chicks” through titillating text messages, or by deliberately exposing his brawn self, or by showing them “that kind of photographs in tabloids”. Does he ever doubt his actions with several girls? “No. But sometimes I think whether I should confess to my wife, when I get married. That’s all,” he replies. ‘Where do you do it all?’ I ask. “There are good places... you have to spend a bit of money,” he says.

Age no bar

The same evening, I meet Nidhi and Neelesh who claim to be in a relationship. “But our relationship would have been incomplete if we didn’t get to know each other very intimately,” the guy explains. This intimacy does not get hindered by the fact that both are yet to complete their pre-University schooling. “There’s no right age for the first sexual experience. If you are ready, just go for it. It’s nobody’s business as long as we are doing it in private,” Neelesh says.

And they don’t seem to worry about the associated health issues. “We are not into multiple partners,” the guy tries to assure me. “Our parents are okay about our friendship. But they don’t know everything that we do,” he adds. “Two of us know each other, and that’s all that should matter,” Nidhi finally opens up in a shy voice. She is “not even used to talking sex with other guys”, I learn, though she reveals that she is into pills. How does she get them? Nidhi won’t tell me that.

For 17-year-old Aziz, “sex is all about making love.” His first experience was with a senior girl in the school, he says. There is “nothing wrong in pre-marital sex or teenage sex”, Aziz contends, “if the concerned people agree to have the pleasurable experience.” So he has no qualms in talking openly about his kind of girls among his friends. “It helps to send the message to the willing chicks,” he says. And he “boldly” goes to medicine shops to get his condoms. “My motto is ‘It’s My Life’, so I must enjoy,” the bright student of a reputed Pune school tells me over coffee.

Sex and sensibility

It took a bit of cajoling to get a young Rachna — whom I know personally — talking and that too over the phone. “Sex takes me to a different level,” she says. “The first time I had sex with my guy, we forged a special bonding,” she maintains about her foray into pre-marital sex. ‘Was there any peer pressure to conform?’ I ask. “No,” replies Rachna. “Initially, there was some resistance from both of us, but because our relationship was stable, we thought that sex will be a good adventure. And it was really so good,” she affirms.

Mumbai-based Ronit got curious about sex when his friends “began to crack vulgar jokes about women”. Till then Ronit — now a student of Standard 10 — had no idea at all about sex. “I too wanted to experience sex. I had told that to one my friends, who’s a girl,” he says in a hesitant voice. “Then one evening, last year, I was at the home of that girl. There was no one else then. She suddenly kissed me... you know. And then she began it... she taught me everything,” he reveals. Gradually, “it became an addiction” for him. “But, we broke up later. Now I feel bad about it all. I am trying to avoid it as much as I can. But it is difficult... it was not just physical,” Ronit says,  hinting at the mental agony such experiences can bring about.

(Few names of the respondents in this survey have been changed to protect their identities.)