One doesn't associate watching naked women in sex romps with gender equality. But, increasingly, women in India are looking at pornography as another step towards women's lib.

A few months ago, PornHub - a popular general interest pornography website - released a study that claimed Indian women were among the highest consumers of pornography in the world. The study, in collaboration with the New York-based news website, The Daily Beast, said that 30 per cent of people who looked at porn via PornHub's multiple partner sites in India were women, six per cent more than the global average of 24 per cent. With an average age of 31, Indian porn watchers were also among the youngest in the world.

The study could have been talking about Tara C., a divorcee who is a big fan of women-centric porn. Tara explains that brutal sex was one reason why she left her husband. "I developed a fear of sex," she says. But after watching pornograpby on her smartphone, she says she understands sexual rights and erotic love. "Now I enjoy sex on my own terms with my new boyfriend."

Hyderabad-based sexual medicine expert Dr Sudhakar Krishnamurti argues that women have always watched porn, but they are now coming out of the closet. Technology - with the spread of smartphones and tabs - has made it easier for them to do so, for one no longer needs to surreptitiously hire porn videos, he points out.

Subhrangshu Aditya, a psychological counsellor at Jadavpur University, agrees. "Previously it was thought that only men get aroused by porn, but now it's proven that visual cues sexually stimulate women too," he says. However, women have their own preference and sexual fantasies. "This is why nowadays you will find sites exclusively for women tagged as 'feminist' pornography." This is a genre of film developed by or for women based on women's self-beliefs of freedom through sexuality, equality and pleasure.

The trend towards porn, many believe, highlights sexual emancipation. Women had always been told to curb their sexual urges, stresses Bishakha Datta, co-founder, Point of View, a non-profit organisation working for gender, sexuality and women's rights. "Watching porn is now simply a sign of sexual expression. A woman can watch porn in relative anonymity," she adds.

Busy lives coupled with the spread of technology have brought about changes in a woman's approach to pornography. Dr Govinda K. Gupta, who runs a sex clinic chain in Calcutta, meets quite a few women who use online porn to sexually stimulate themselves. "Many of them have a busy life in the corporate sector and are too tired to have sex after work. For them, it's much more convenient to watch porn for sexual arousal and masturbation."

Dr Gupta sometimes recommends online pornography to married women who have lost interest in sex to pep up their conjugal lives. He cites the case of a 26-year-old woman who'd had breast cancer surgery and wasn't interested in intercourse. He advised her to watch pornography.

S.K., a 30-year old woman who runs a small fashion boutique in Mumbai, needs no such advice: she watches porn on her smartphone whenever she doesn't have any buyer in the shop. "My marriage didn't last even a year because of a disappointing sex life. So now I am hooked to a few sites," she says.

S.K. got worried when she found that she enjoyed watching pornography even when she was in a relationship. Pavan Sonar, a Mumbai-based sexologist whom she consulted, assured her that an occasional peek into porn sites was okay. But he warned her against making it a compulsive habit.

"There's nothing unusual about a woman watching porn if she is not sexually satisfied, or cannot have sex on a regular basis," he says.

Author Ira Trivedi writes in India in Love: Marriage and Sexuality in 21st Century that Indian women are increasingly watching porn, and in many cases their sex partners approve of pornography. "In some small towns women watch porn without the knowledge of their partners, showing that women are becoming more sexually curious, and that porn is not just a male domain any more," she notes.

"Why should pornography be an exclusive domain of men," asks Sreemoyee Piu Kundu, author of the erotic novel Sita's Curse. "[Protagonist] Meera Patel is a woman whose husband is impotent. She finds love virtually by surfing an adult site. She masturbates and enjoys cyber sex with a younger man," she says.

Pornography is making Indian women stand up for their sexual rights, stresses Dharmendra Nathwani, who runs a chain of lingerie shops across India. The shop also sells "pleasure enhancement" products. "Many women call me up and refer to specific porn sites for a particular product," he says.

Some experts, however, voice concern about the trend. "Sometimes watching pornography can create problems in marriages instead of pepping up someone's sex life," warns Varsha Patkar, Mumbai-based clinical psychologist and marriage counsellor. "When the line between fantasy and reality gets blurred, some women may have unrealistic demands of their partners, creating further rifts in one's conjugal life."

The experts also caution women against porn addiction. Debarati Halder, director, Centre for Cyber Victim Counselling, Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu, has counselled college girls who can't have enough of porn. "Given that you can get cheap smartphones and cheap Internet data packages, even girls from small towns have easy access to online pornography," she says. She has also come across cases where women are forced to watch porn by their male partners.

Warns Datta of Point of View, "Porn is a sign of free sexual expression for a woman as long as she is not pressured to watch it."

S.K. and Tara C. know the pitfalls, but nevertheless enjoy watching pornography. "I watch very selective and realistic pornography. You can call it erotica," Tara says. "Also, I watch porn only with my male partner."

Tara stresses that there is nothing unusual in erotica. "I have been to temples in Konark and Khajuraho and I know these things are perfectly normal in adult relationships," she says. "Indian seers knew this centuries ago."

Poll retold

The study by the website PornHub in collaboration with the New York-based news website The Daily Beast says:
♦ 30 per cent of Indians watching porn regularly are women, up from 26 per cent last year
♦ The worldwide average is 24 per cent, up by one per cent 
♦ The Philippines and Brazil take the lead with 35 per cent female viewers, followed by India and Argentina 
♦ Using high-tech analytics software, the study reveals that women are also more selective than men when it comes to online porn viewing
♦ Japan has the largest proportional gap between male and female porn viewers (83 per cent male vs 17 per cent female)
♦ Women in the US rank low (23 per cent women and 77 per cent male)
♦ Nearly 24 per cent of women in France visit online porn websites regularly
♦ Globally, the core audience for porn is still predominantly male, but there has been a surge in women porn viewers among the millennial generation (those born after 1980). According to the data, 60 per cent of porn-watching millennials watch it on their smartphones while only 33 per cent watch porn on computers. ‘Lesbian’ is the most popular search term. The data, however, suggests that the people searching in this category are not necessarily gay.