Sex and Indians: 20 SHOCKING revelations!

Whether we like to admit it or not, we as a country are pretty obsessed with sex. India Today and Outlook -- two of India's popular news and current affairs magazines throw light on sexual habits of Indians.

News and current affairs magazines -- India Today and Outlook -- conducted their annual surveys that shed light on the sexual habits and preferences amongst Indians.

While the Outlook-Durex sex survey 2011 focussed on respondents between the age group of 30 and 45 years, India Today's survey in association with The Nielsen Company, cast the net rather wide interviewing people within the age group of 18-60 years.

That perhaps should explain some of the contradictory findings in the surveys.

Take this for starters.

The Outlook survey declares that 94 per cent Indians under 45 say their sex life rocks.

On the contrary according to the India Today survey, 33 per cent wives say that 'sex becomes boring after a few years of marriage'.

Illustrations: Uttam Ghosh and Dominic Xavier

According to the Outlook-Durex Sex Survey 2011, 40.3 per cent Indians are 'very satisfied' with their current sex life while 53.6 per cent are 'satisfied'.

Somewhat contrarily, respondents surveyed by India Today paint a different picture. 48 per cent husbands according to that survey confess that their ideal bedmate isn't their wife whereas 49 per cent of wives tend to avoid having sex by faking a headache.

According to the India Today survey, 66 per cent husbands admitted to watching porn and 23 per cent said that they had extramarital affairs.

28 per cent husbands, the survey revealed, were okay with the idea of having one-night stands and 16 per cent seemed alright with the idea of wife-swapping too.

An interesting 33.4 per cent of couples, according to the Outlook-Durex Sex Survey, pegged the ideal number of times to have sex each month between 11 and 20 times.

32.1 per cent of respondents also felt that the ideal level of sexual activity for a couple can be more than twice a week and 31.3 per cent said once a week.

When asked if sex in the middle age has become more enjoyable than when they were younger, 46 per cent of respondents in the Outlook survey said it was the same but more interestingly, 44 per cent said it had indeed become better.

In yet another interesting insight, the Outlook survey revealed that the frequency of lovemaking had NOT gone down as compared to five years ago for 55.8 per cent of respondents. 44.2 per cent however said they had more active sex lives back then.

According to the Outlook survey 70.8 per cent couples are now more open to sexual experimentation. 68.4 per cent of these credited better comfort levels with their partners as the reason for opening up while 39 per cent said it had to with a better understanding of their own bodies.

The one point that both surveys seem to agree on generally is the fact that the smaller towns are sexually more active and fulfilled.

According to the India Today survey 74 per cent people in Jaipur and 57 per cent in Ludhiana claimed that they were 'always' sexually fulfilled.

According to the Outlook survey the 73 per cent of people in Jaipur were 'very satisfied.

Interestingly the same survey revealed that 68 per cent of people in Jaipur said the frequency of lovemaking had NOT gone down in the last five years, a statistic that was beaten only by Kochi where 91 per cent of the respondents seemed to be having more sex today than they were five years ago.

The Outlook survey revealed that having sex with a younger person was one of the most prominent sexual fantasies amongst people of both genders (23 per cent) while sex with a celebrity came at number four with 12.4 per cent respondents confessing to fantasising about sleeping with a well-known figure.

Vidya Balan and Salman Khan topped the list of most attractive celebrities in the survey.

The India Today survey sheds further light on this aspect revealing that movie stars are India's most desirable people and politicians the least. It also suggests that as many as 48 per cent men crave to have sex with actresses.

Interestingly the India Today survey reveals that 65 per cent couples fantasise about various sexual positions. Yet over half of them don't bother to experiment.

Shedding light on India's online behaviour, the Outlook survey reveals the following:

56.9 per cent of respondents feel that social media like Twitter and Facebook have not improved their chances of finding sexual partners (33.7 per cent said yes, 9.3 per cent didn't know or couldn't say).

77.6 per cent of the people questioned confessed that they were never attracted to someone they met online (22.4 per cent said yes).

35.1 per cent people went ahead and met the people they were introduced to online (64.9 per cent didn't)

Of those who did, 58.3 per cent respondents confessed that such a meeting eventually ended up in bed.

The India Today survey reveals that 77 per cent of single women use the morning-after pill while 26 per cent married women do the same.

According to the India Today survey 14 per cent women admitted to having had an abortion at least once in their lives. Of these, a whopping 39 per cent were single women.

Shockingly, the survey further reveals that 9 per cent of women said that the gender of the foetus was the reason for the abortion. 39 per cent confessed that they aborted because it was an unplanned pregnancy.

In a strange statistic -- 67 per cent women in Jaipur and 26 per cent women in Delhi didn't seem to know why they had an abortion at all.

According to the India Today survey, 10 per cent men and 5 per cent women confessed having incestuous relationships.

Of these 15 per cent, 30 per cent respondents confessed that they had sex with an uncle, aunt, parent, sibling or in-laws.

A whopping 69 per cent men (of the 10 per cent who said yes) said they engaged in incestuous sex by choice while 52 per cent confessed that their first sexual encounter was thanks to a member in their family.

The India Today survey sheds further light on extramarital relationships -- 23 per cent men confessed to having one as against 8 per cent women.

Of these, 37 per cent female respondents said that their spouse knew about this affair while a shocking 69 per cent of the men said no.

These figures come somewhat close to the Outlook survey too. 25.4 per cent people confessed that they have had sex with someone outside of their marriage.

Of these 48.4 per cent respondents have slept with their friends/batchmates, 14.3 per cent with their colleagues, 11.7 per cent with their neighbours, 9.1 per cent with their spouse's friends and 5.5 per cent with one of their relatives.

Another interesting insight of the India Today survey was that 19 per cent people felt that 'one should be sexually experienced before marriage' and 17 per cent agreed that virginity doesn't matter.

The same survey reveals that 37 per cent men have had more than one sexual partner in their lives as against 12 per cent women.

The India Today survey reveals that 25 per cent couples are okay with premarital sex as long as it doesn't involve their families.

Interestingly 32 per cent of these very couples have engaged in premarital sex themselves.

According to the India Today survey 61 per cent respondents said live-in relationships were unacceptable.

The India Today survey further reveals that 66 per cent men surf porn avidly while 34 per cent women do the same. 49 per cent of these women prefer to watch porn only with their partners.

This shouldn't be unusual as 60 per cent of working couples confess they have to depend on 'visual stimulus to get turned on'.

Among the most interesting find of the India Today survey were these:

44 per cent Delhiites had their first sex as teenagers and 51 per cent had already lost their virginity before they got married.

Bangalore is the most sexually active city -- 25 per cent have sex daily as against 10 per cent nationally 41 per cent swap wives, 52 per cent opt for one-night stands and 30 per cent have flings with the consent of their partners.