It’s no secret that many in India would give an arm and a leg for Sunny Leone. She is the Dream Girl for the 21st century. She tops Google’s ‘Most Searched Indian Entertainers 2017’ list.
But now it seems that there are Indians who would literally give their lives for her. The members of the Karnataka Rakshana Vedike Yuva Sene have claimed their 15 minutes of fame by threatening to commit mass suicide if Sunny Leone showed up, as billed, at a New Year’s Eve party in Bengaluru. Hitherto, their parent wing had been worried about issues like the Kaveri water dispute and imposition of Hindi.
National pride
The youth wing explained that they were against Sunny Leone wearing short dresses. They disapproved of her past. They worried she was spoiling the culture of the land.
“We shouldn’t be encouraging such people,” said a leader. “We will not hesitate to commit suicide on December 31.”
Mass suicide to protest dishonour? Echoes of Padmavati! Except here the Yuva Sene are the ones fearing the dishonour and the beautiful woman is the one doing the dishonouring. Someday Sanjay Leela Bhansali could direct this version — Kalyug ki Padmavati.
The Yuva Sene should have taken a second look at Sunny Leone, which the rest of their compatriots keep doing if Google statistic are to be believed. They would have realised she is the natural cover girl for the government’s pet Made in India story.
Technically Made in Canada, Sunny Leone’s certainly been Re-Made in India — a bona fide Indian manufacturing success story we should tomtom with pride. But we want to bring down hoardings where Sunny, as the face of Manforce condoms, advises the Dandiya-dancers of Gujarat to “play, but with love” during Navaratri.
We want her off the New Year’s Eve programme. We just want her to live discreetly in our mobile phones, WhatsApp groups and browsers in incognito mode. She’s our private pride and public shame.
Several years ago I remember watching my first Sunny Leone film in a theatre in Bongaigaon in Assam. Mayapuri was the only theatre in town. Jism 2 was the only film playing in it. The seats creaked. The ceiling fans whirred loudly. The ticket checker was in a banian . There were some two hundred men in that theatre.
I did see one woman who seemed to be on a date night with her husband. But it must have been nerve-wracking because as soon as the lights went down the entire audience hollered as one as if we’d all been dunked into a jacuzzi of bubbling testosterone.
I could not make out anything Sunny said. Every time she showed up, the audience erupted into wolf whistles. In the end it was just a gigantic tease. The clothes might have been skimpy but what the film really skimped on was the sex. In the age where hardcore porn is just a mouse-click away, this was coitus interruptus on a loop, two-plus hours of airbrushed frustration.
I clearly remember a man shouting “ Pet bhorey nai” (My stomach is not full) as yet another love scene faded to black and the audience booed lustily. I recall thinking with horror that thousands of frustrated men like these were pouring out of theatres in towns across the length and breadth of India.
That is not Sunny Leone’s problem. It’s our problem and it’s the problem of assorted groups who periodically want to burn her effigy. What probably upsets them most is Sunny does not try to whitewash her past or turn it into a sob story. She has not followed the Good Girls Guide of how to go from Dirty Picture to Swachh Bharat.
She has moved on but we have not. In the process she brings us face to face with our own hypocrisy about sex, especially sex as pleasure.
Tears and heaven
It’s that same hypocrisy that demands no condom ads sully our televisions before 10pm as if condom ads are the pressing problem as opposed to say, gang-rapes. If condoms are not seen and Sunny Leone does not dance, our glorious culture is somehow being protected.
None of that means we have sex on our minds any less or that we get better sex education. Our version of the birds and the bees involve judges telling us about peacocks that mate via their tears.
The Yuva Sene got their way this time. The Bengaluru police have denied permission to the Sunny Leone performance because they have too much to do on New Year’s Eve. The valiant youth of the Yuva Sene are safe. The impressionable good citizens at the New Year’s Eve gala are safe. Our ancient culture is safe.
Now if only the sex we were having was equally safe. But if you are reading this anytime between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m. please pretend I didn’t write that.
The writer is the author of Don’t Let Him Know , and like many Bengalis likes to let everyone know about his opinions whether asked or not
