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Our ancients weren’t as squeamish about skimpy clothes or sexual matters as we are now. Where did we leave behind behind our good sense?
Indians don’t talk about sex. In fact, we don’t really really have it. It’s just the flowers touching. Skirts and short dresses are against ‘Indian culture’, which crumbles the moment it sees a woman’s uncovered leg, shoulder or midriff.
Love or war – we dressed in style!
Sex is dirty, tolerable only as a sacred duty to procreate? (Or wait, didn’t our glorious ancestors figure a sanskari way to procreate that didn’t require genitals?). Someone’s brilliant brainwave, very popular, and not just with khap nut cases or card burning vigilantes.
And if you look at the history of our ancestors, you find that great great granddad and grandmom were really colourful people. And, I am talking of the ‘glorious past’, India’s Vishwaguru days. And I’m sure as hell they’d be laughing their backsides off from up above – granddad with a stole on his bare chest and grandmom in her teeny weeny shiny bustier.
There is sexism in our epics. There is power politics, there is discrimination, there is the evil side of men and women and there is punishment and redemption. However, there is very little of this squeamishness about sex and the idea of keeping genitals under lock and key which we today propagate.
To start with, the nation itself is named after king Bharat who was the love child of Shakuntala and Dushyant born out of their rendezvous in one of his hunting trips in the forest, even if they had supposedly exchanged garlands!
The greatest epic of Mahabharata is written by Vyas who was born of single mother Satyavati and brought up by single dad Rishi Parasher. Yes sir. Premarital sex is not something they dreamt up in the west.
All the Pandavas were born out of wedlock. Their dad, Pandu too was born out of wedlock. Even Kauravas’ dad Dhritrashtra was born outside marriage and so was the wise Vidur.
Follow your elders, yo.
Khajuraho depicts sexual acts which would make pornhub look like kindergarten. Vatsyayan wrote Kamasutra some 2500 years back when humans everywhere else were still concerned with making fire by rubbing stones (dang, even that sounds raunchy).
Apsaras never shied away from using their sexuality for purely material ends which often times didn’t even concern them.
Our goddesses were never ashamed of their bodies – check out sculptures of Goddess Kali in her most potent and destructive form.
Vedic texts are full of sexually liberal narratives. Kama is one of the pillars of the ancient Indian way of life. The sages and wise people had sex, had kids and many times, it was way outside the confines of conservative sexuality.
Our forefathers were comfortable with sex. They treated it maturely and my guess is, they weren’t maniacally obsessed about it. Sexual repression was never our way of life.
Oh yes, we always wore sexy clothes, be it men, women or Gods. Be it love or war.
A version of this was published here earlier.
Image source: YouTube
IIMA. IIT KGP | Founder www.BodhiSutra.com | Author | Debut novel, The Jeera Packer | Bullethead | Bollywood
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