Women Of 2010 Want More SEX

Overturn the idea that women favour a romantic encounter - a walk in the rain, a bouquet of roses - while men prefer to fall into bed. Check out the intricacies of the new woman's erotic litany: sex is crucial, say 70 per cent of women. No wonder, they are eager to make their sexual lives more exciting, with new situations (67 per cent) and positions (20 per cent), new types of foreplay (24 per cent), and sex anytime, anywhere. Pleasure is paramount, their own and that of their partners' (57 per cent). But that quest for hardcore sexuality is squashing intimacy and romance faster than bedbugs.

There she is, fragrant on bath salts, waiting for him to look up and notice her in her lacy camisole. And there he is, sprawled on the bed, flipping channels languidly, spoilt for choice between cricket and pole dancing on the telly. He finally looks up, yawns and reaches out for her. She looks disgusted and hisses at him, "Undress yourself." And she is not alone. Between 2003, when INDIA TODAY-AC Nielsen-ORG MARG sex survey first focused on "What Women Want" and now, the percentage of women not interested in "undressing" their partners as a preferred mode of foreplay has petered down from 16 per cent to 8 per cent.



At the root of this pleasure quest could be the post-modern woman's desire to take charge of her own destiny. And, as matrimonial sites point out, it starts early. Courtships in arranged marriages these days find city girls asking some tough questions to their would-bes, as reported by a 2009 partner preference study by Bharat Matrimony: from "how close do you want to live to your parents?" to "do you expect me to stop working once we have children?" And, of course, the inevitable: "What's your idea of spending alone time?" "Compatibility is emerging as the primary evaluation criteria," says Murugavel Janakiraman, CEO, Bharat Matrimony. "This is one area where we see the most dramatic changes."


There is, obviously, a paradox at work. Those demands for companionate autonomy seem to take a serious beating once the mundaneness of everyday life kicks in (to 42 per cent men and women "quality time at home" constitutes a "perfect romantic day"). No wonder, the imagined world of romance leads to disenchantment and forced reconciliation of reality with fantasy. To begin with, fewer women find their partners "romantic" than men (51:66 per cent). While 71 per cent of men share their sexual fantasies with partners, just 12 per cent women find men enthusiastic about theirs. To top it all, women don't seem to be "talking" to men to communicate their needs: those willing to discuss disappointing sex has dropped by 8 per cent between 2003 and 2010. But in a new turn, women seem keen to "tell" their partners that extra-marital liberties on their part would be promptly reciprocated.