After situationships blurred the lines of commitment, dating has found a new phrase to obsess over. It is called the sunset clause. Simply put, two people decide in advance that their relationship will last till a specific date. If both still feel invested when that date arrives, they renew it. If not, they part without drama. Think of it as love on probation, with mutual consent.
The idea has gained traction globally and in India, especially among young urban daters who value clarity over chaos. But in a city like Kolkata, where romance still carries poetry, nostalgia and emotional excess, the idea has sparked equal parts curiosity, humour and discomfort.
Practical or too practical
For Dyuti Banerjee, a homechef who met her husband on a dating app and is about to complete a year of marriage, the concept sounds amusingly clinical. She laughs at the idea of planning a breakup in advance, wondering how emotions are expected to follow a schedule. “Practical, but too practical. I am very curious to see an example couple now. You plan to part, and then in Maugham-style, one gets stuck in love, the other makes an exit or dies trying. This concept is sure to end up in an Ayushman Khurrana movie,” she said.
A sense of emotional imbalance is precisely what makes others uncomfortable. Mousumi Roy, a mother to a Gen Alpha child, sees the sunset clause as something driven entirely by logic. “Here only the brain works, the heart has no role. Even the word mechanical falls short to define it,” she said.
A contract, not a commitment
Some Kolkatans see the sunset clause less as a love hack and more as a legal agreement. “If it has a sunset clause then it is a contract. A time-bound contract which may or may not be renewed,” said Rahul Sequeira, a Kolkata-based business development executive. For him, the language itself reveals how relationships are increasingly mirroring workplace structures.
IT professional and a millennial, Resham Das agrees. “Everything has become so transactional these days,” he said, calling the sunset clause another reflection of how emotions are being negotiated rather than felt.
Logic meets modern anxiety
Content creator Raina Kshetry offers a more supportive take. She believes the clause fits modern marriages and relationships. “I think both parties should ideally put a seven-year time for any renewal of vows,” she said. “Psychology states that humans have an overall personality change every seven years. Given how gamophobic humans are these days, such conditions lessen anxiety and focus more on spending time with each other. We humans work better if there are deadlines, right?”
Freelance visual artist Panchali Kar echoes the logic. “Very logical approach, to be honest. The previous generations did not understand that love and relationship are often not synonymous. Glad that this generation understands,” she stated.
Where emotions still matter
Not everyone is convinced that structure can co-exist with intimacy. Video producer Sudeshna feels that once emotions enter the picture, timelines become irrelevant. “Are eta to purotai physical, but dil ka kya? (This is entirely physical, but what about the heart?),” she says. “If you’re emotionally involved, the idea of a timeline doesn’t even come to mind. These days, the tagline of relationships seems to be ‘pehle istemal karein, phir biswas karein. (use first, trust later.)’ So I think it’s okay. Emotions only bring complexity, and people don’t like complexity anymore.”
Homechef Debjani Chatterjee puts it more wryly. “Okay so a gel pen turned into a relationship. Is it?” she asked, likening the clause to something that works only till the ink runs out.
Gen Z student Meghna Saha takes a more reflective stance. “I think we are obsessing about terms these days,” she said. “But do you really think a relationship can be defined by just one label? The contract is dicey. When emotions are involved, only time will tell whether it lasts or not. It really depends on the dynamic they share.”
The mental health angle
On paper, the sunset clause appears emotionally evolved. It replaces vague situationships with clarity, consent and a pre-decided pause for reflection. When two people enter such an agreement with full awareness, emotional honesty and the ability to part respectfully if it no longer serves them, it can indeed feel healthy. In that sense, it promises responsibility over emotional chaos.
But relationships, psychologists remind us, are not contracts signed by robots.
“Time, shared experiences, vulnerability and repeated emotional exchanges naturally create attachment and meaning. The longer two people are together, the more the bond becomes woven into one’s emotional world and even identity. That’s where the complication begins,” said Sritama Ghosh, counselling psychologist at Monoshij.
According to her, awareness alone does not dissolve attachment. “For someone with an anxious attachment style, a sunset clause ending can feel like losing their primary source of comfort, even if the relationship was unhealthy. The nervous system doesn’t operate on logic,” she explained. Even avoidant partners, she added, may appear to leave easily, but unresolved emotional patterns often pull both people back into cycles of separation and reconnection, driven less by choice and more by unmet needs.
Ghosh warns that in a time when deep self-reflection is rare and external validation abundant, such arrangements can quietly become emotionally addictive. “The bond starts serving validation rather than connection. Thoughts like ‘I’ve invested so much of myself here, how do I just walk away?’ make leaving the idea of the relationship harder than leaving the toxicity itself,” she said. What looks like clarity, she cautions, can become a carefully packaged emotional trap unless both people are actively doing inner work alongside the agreement.
Counselling psychologist Pragya Priya Mandal of Monoshij echoes similar concerns. While the clause may offer autonomy and a sense of freedom to explore without long-term binding, it does not affect both partners equally. “It might leave one person tremendously anxious, constantly wondering whether they will be chosen after the re-evaluation,” she explained. In such cases, dating risks becoming performative. “Rather than exploration, it can turn into a very long interview.”