This time targeting teenage school drop outs, UNICEF and the Nehru Yuva Kendra have roped in the Song and Drama division of the Ministry of Information and Broadasting to launch a new awareness program in Tamilnadu. This move has been driven by the UNICEF estimate that one of every two new HIV infections is in the 15-24 age group – and that young people who do not go to school have fewer points of exposure to HIV awareness and intervention programs.
This report in the Hindu says, About 1,500 of these will volunteer as peer educators and participate in a three-day long programme and work closely with non-government organisations to create awareness on sexually transmitted diseases and HIV, risk behaviour and trained on behaviour change, communication and life skills required to convince their peers back in their villages to say ‘No to pre-marital sex’ (emphasis mine).
***
Oops. Does this actually suggest that out of school teens in Tamilnadu – and young people in general – actually indulge in pre-marital sex? Is there no morality left in the world? First actress Khushboo says this and now the UNICEF. What about the honour of the Tamil people and women in general? (Of course, Khushboo did fly back in a hurry from Singapore to apologize to her beloved Tamil fans saying that she meant no slur on the good name of all the chaste Tamil girls and women – but the harm was done anyways, wasn’t it?)
Pre-marital sex. Huh!
And also drinking and dancing in hotel bars – not the Bombay Red Rose / Shabnam variety – but the Park in Chennai. I would link to the original Dinamalar piece which carried pictures from the party – but this is a clean family blog and those pictures are downright immoral – just picture this for now – girls wearing tops with spaghetti straps and actually drinking liquor from a bottle.
Shiva, shiva… I need to have a purifying bath again now.
All these dissenting voices. What do they know of Tamil culture?
I guess it is in anticipation of trouble that the Hindu article on the HIV awareness program states this inside a box right on top – There is no study to show that talk on sex have led to increased sex.
Private note : Sunil, read Ammani’s comment 🙂
All these dissenting voices. What do they know of Tamil culture?
I do know a fair bit about Tamil Culture you know…
Tamizh culture is the bestest in the world. And Tamizh karpu! Don’t get me started! Sex? What sex? Our children fall out of the skies. Don’t you know that HIV and AIDS are imported diseases?
Chandru, aiyyo is all I can say for now. read the post carefully again and understand the tone.
A, I was going to write about karpu. and then thought the same – let me not get started on that one. karpu is the biggest tamizh usp after thaali – or is karpu above everything else! 🙂
and I so agree with your comment somewhere – am glad I am out of it.
We are just perfect, if not for the influence of the foreign culture there will no evils in the society. Oh ****cks
I replied in the same tone Charu. Tsk tsk. Two can play at the game of sarcasm you know… 😉
Listen both of you Ammani and Charu. In all sincerity, and not a trace of sarcasm, I am not glad I am out of Chennai/Madras. But I do feel that this case is pathetic, demeaning, and absolutely unnecessary.
Ravages
Does the fact that you are a man and may never have suffered some of the humiliations that as women, Charu and I may have experienced have anything to do with the way you feel vis-a-vis our opinion on being out of Chennai?
Charu, Karpu rocks! Now if you will excuse me, I have to fall at my husband’s feet and kannula othify my thaali and pray to god to keep me a sumangali and make my husband bru coffee while he does kurumbu to me…you see, I’m a pathini….no, not starving, paTThini, yes, like Kannagi. 🙂
see Charu, the rishi looks at a woman and she gives birth. you go and worship in a temple and a baby is born. tamizha pray a lot – where is the time for sex.
and all those hotels in the afternoon – it is prayer meetings that our youngsters go to.
Sarcasm aside, i think it is also the ostrich complex. my kid can’t have sex complex. And i don’t think that it is a problem with TN alone, but with the rest of India. The Sena protests against sex. if a south indian actress from mumbai – let’s say rekha – had made a comment about maharashtrian teens having sex – the reaction from the Sena would have made the reaction against Khushboo seem like a polite tea party.
I guess TN’s development also makes it the pioneer in introducing such schemes. It is not that other states do not have this problem. It is just that they will face it later!!
C, I know you dont like being out of chennai – as for me, cant bear the thought of living in that city ever again. but dont worry – hyderbad will also get as exciting soon 🙂
A, you forgot the kungumam and poo. what kind of pathini are you? and also when your husband does the kurumbu, you must say, ponga, neenga aalanlum romba idu – and blush.
and C again, A speaks from PTC bus experience, methinx.
Uma, (is this any Uma I know?) – of course, if not for foreign influence, the concept of babies would have never come to India!
Harini, what can I say? except this hoary chestnut – “sex is hereditary – if you don’t have it, chances are your kids won’t either” 🙂
no, no…..all wrong. Babies dont come from the sky, they materialized from ether, created by thought.
I’ll have to have a word or ten with the wife, and tell her about karpu, and kannula otthifying thaali, and a few essential duties of a pattini, and stuff like that…….(after wearing protective clothing and a helmet ofcourse).
But, trying to look at positives, TN is one of the few states that at least has an HIV awareness program. The other states haven’t woken up to that yet………and pretend that it is a foreign problem.
Sigh.
I don’t know about karpu, but my grandma is scandalised every time my sister addresses her husband by name.
Harini, also I think it is not just about Khushboo being an outsider – it is more to do with TN’s idea(l) of itself as a “chastity-above-all” state – am sure even if (not rekha but) a maharashtrian, say Urmila M had said such a thing, it would have erupted -but taken on a different dimension – how can one of us say such a thing types…?
Aditya and others, that is what karpu means in fact – is a nebulous word (which would have become dated but for Tamil cinema) meaning anything from virtue to chastity to plain virginity – only for women – there is of course no concept of karpu for men.
Sunil, good luck 🙂
(actually I was thinking of your comment on chappan’s recent post)
ammani, my being a man isn’t any kind of reflection on why i love chennai. Its a fantstic city, loads of fun, loads more of histry, i grew up there, studied there, most of my friends are there. The recent incident is pathetic, crazy, stupid, a gross violation and plain unnecessary. But these don’t happen every year, do they? I know friends in Bangalore and Bombay, female friends, who were assaulted in broad daylight.
The case isn’t specific to chennai alone. Every city in India is facing some kind of moral policing or the other, and to variying degrees. Chennai just happens to be the latest victim. If tomorrow Hyderabad bans woman from wearing jeans or demand they wear the burqah, we would all forget the Park incident and rant about islamic fundamentalism and moral policing in Hyderabad.
Besides, I have suffered too, yes, as a man. Take charu’s example of the public buses. An entire side’s reserved for women, and they fill it up and spill over to the other side. I have had woman demanding I get up from my seat just because they couldn’t find seating on the other, ladies, side. Yet, I love that city.
“is this any Uma I know” – Probably not, just another person totally wound up over the whole snogging in ‘public’ episode. 4 days later I am still trying to calm down over the incident!
Ravages, I had no idea you have suffered so much in life. My heart bleeds for you.
Uma, oh, ok – I read your post on this too. (there are atleast 2 other Umas who are regulars on this blog – which is why I asked :))
“is this any Uma I know” – Apologies, should remember to sign off as Wicked Angel all the time and not confuse people. Don’t think I am one of the Uma’s you know though. Loved yours and Ammani’s comments on Karpu
i agree. that was very run of the mill. but then, when accuses me of saying I love madras for I am a man, i take necessary measures
Ravages
I was born and spent the first 24 years of my life in Chennai. I was molested in some form or the other almost every day that I spent in Chennai and somehow took it to be the norm everywhere (it didn’t cease to rankle though). I spent the next 5 years in Mumbai and do not ever recall suffering any form of humiliation. And every visit back to Chennai just reminded me what I’d had to endure and my affection for the city has steadily grown less and less. I do make my annual visit but that’s more out of duty than anything else. I would rather be stuck in a traffic jam in Saki Naka for 4.5 hours (believe me, I have) than ever board a 45B Pallavan bus any time of the day.
Regards
A
Sunil, true that TN is one of the few states with a good HIV awareness program (I keep writing about this) but it is also one of the high prevalence states. have never been able to reconcile this with the high develpoment indices that TN boasts of – are you aware of any study that explains the reasons / sources of this AIDS epidemic in the state?
Charu,
Karnataka is a high-prevelance state as well and the reasons here are apparently the high transient population (truck drivers, etc.) who visit the state for a while and infect mostly the people in the sex industry. This happens a lot along the borders, so I’m sure the same causes would apply to TN as well.
You need a study to explain the reasons/sources of the AIDS epidemic in the state? Where have you been living?!!! Males here do what they want, when they want, to whom they want. They are brought up as gods and most of the time, die that way as they are never convinced to think otherwise. They know no restraint on bodily functions. They pee where and when they want, not caring who sees. Women are brought up to submit, submit, submit to everything all the time. As for joint households, you will find studies that show that incest is a lot more common than we would care to think. Some women are safer in the streets than at home with their own male relatives. Like Muslims, women are not considered to really have souls here. They cover up their women as if the women are evil and cause their lust. Women are expected to be covered here. Why? The males know the evil in their own hearts and don’t trust other men, knowing exactly how they think. So who suffers? She was asking for it, right? Right? In your dreams. Until the males grow up and become men, TN will be what it is and not what it could be. Women, it’s your fault. Train your sons to be men.
You need a study to explain the reasons/sources of the AIDS epidemic in the state? Where have you been living?!!! Males here do what they want, when they want, to whom they want. They are brought up as gods and most of the time, die that way as they are never convinced to think otherwise. They know no restraint on bodily functions. They pee where and when they want, not caring who sees. Women are brought up to submit, submit, submit to everything all the time. As for joint households, you will find studies that show that incest is a lot more common than we would care to think. Some women are safer in the streets than at home with their own male relatives. Like Muslims, women are not considered to really have souls here. They cover up their women as if the women are evil and cause their lust. Women are expected to be covered here. Why? The males know the evil in their own hearts and don’t trust other men, knowing exactly how they think. So who suffers? She was asking for it, right? Right? In your dreams. Until the males grow up and become men, TN will be what it is and not what it could be. Women, it’s your fault. Train your sons to be men–gentlemen.
Ammani, I’m sorry. I do accept that my perceptions of Madras might differ from yours. I haven’t seen or heard of incidents such as you describe. I haven’t even heard of people who have had such experiences.
Ravages,
I feel that it is better for chennai, that people who are GLAD to be OUT are really OUT 😉 And we should be really GLAD for that 🙂
Not really Ferrari. i wouldn’t go that far. there might be reasons, and it is very clear these are pretty strong reasons why they feel that way. i love madras, still do, and don’t like being out. but i can’t expect others to toe my line…
Sujatha, that is true, but this should hold for other states as well…? my feeling has always been that HIV prevalence has been well documented in TN as opposed to many other states… for instance, in Bihar and UP, it is claimed that there is zero prevalence… find it very hard to believe.
Kanmani, I suggest you relax and open your eyes wide to the fact that the situation you have described is in no way unique to Tamilnadu. On most develpoment indicators, TN is ahead of most other states. there has to be some other social factor that is causing this skew…
Ravages, what Ammani has said happens to most women – of course, it happens n Bombay too but to a much much lesser extent.
And thanks for being balanced about this 🙂 (no sarcasm intended, am glad you responded to ferrari – am in mood to respond to such comments myself)
PEACE 🙂
I know how some people utilise the crowd, to abuse women. And a famous director even made a movie, teaching youngsters how to abuse women(Read as BOYS). Point noted! You dont need to like the city. But dont criticise and insult people living there. Not everyone is like that!
Ferrari, where did you get the impression that anyone here has criticized or insulted people living in chennai?!
Ponnungala
There’s more to the issue than meets the eye. Before the interview to India Today, Khushboo and fellow pathinis from the industry had taken director Thankar Bachan to task for insinuating that all Kollywood heroines are hoes (they gheraoed him and forced him to fall at their feet and apologize — so much for democracy). The people who slippered her and her kids at the airport are his political campwallahs. A new gang of Tamil culture protectors is on the prowl out here in Chennai and they are making life miserable for everyone. Kaappathungo!
But tell me my dear friends….
Doesn’t Thangar Bachan entitled to have the same freedom of expression as Khusboo is overwhelmingly supported to have?
Why did she overwhelmingly accept his apology from the first bench then ?(I am not going to talk about stuff like she could have given some respect for his age(Manorama is OK) bcos you guys are too yanki-ised to talk about cultural values)
Did any Mac on the vast blogshere thought about freedom of speech then?
I want a reply from everyone who has commented on this episode.
RAJK- AN NRI TAMILIAN.
this is for Raj K
a) labelling all actresses as prostitutes is slander. not freedom of speech. it doesn’t matter how old the person who is commenting on this is. It is akin to saying NRI’s are traitors for running away form the motherland. We can’t say whatever we want to – to make an impact – and then claim freedome of speech. It simply doesn’t not hold water. (and before people start flaming me – i don’t believe that NRI’s are very much Indian, i have a brother, and a whole bunch of cousins who are NRI – the statement was to make a point and not divert the topic).
b) to say that educated men don’t expect their wives to be virgins is a shocking statement – not slanderous. probably because sex before marriage has become fairly common in the metros.And the political/moral police class is yet to wake up and smell the coffee.
Sex was always a part of life in rural india. It is urban middle class india that is shaking of the vestiges victorian morality and accepting sex as being a normal biological/human function.
I think also that one of the things being missed out in this entire issue is that khushboo is Jayalalitha’s protege and Bachan is supported by the DMK. i was reading somewhere that JJ wants Khushboo to stand against stalin next year.
So i would take this entire fracas with Khushboo and Bachan with a few kilos of salt.
On the newspaper jamming into the hotel and invading privacy – that is a different story. i realy don’t know why we are making a song and dance about 2 consenting adults smooching in public. just look at the music videos or song sequences in hindi and tamil films, and you will see a lot more flesh, sex, rock and roll and a lot more. i guess that the political classes have an interest in the business of movie making and keep quiet. while it is far more easy to pick on ordinary citizens letting their hair down.
oops that should read – NRI’s are very much Indian . sorry for the typo
Ram, I knew there had to soem political motivation behind this! even in the park case, wasn’t there some other kid of some powerful man who wa spartying that night – but was spared – am very fuzzy about the details…
Harini, you shouldn’t have bothered – I wasn’t planning to respond to RajK’s comment – the tone is enough to put me off. but yes, the political angle has kind of been ignored in this whole morality thingy…
“my feeling has always been that HIV prevalence has been well documented in TN as opposed to many other states… for instance, in Bihar and UP, it is claimed that there is zero prevalence… find it very hard to believe.”
Charu, yes, that would be very hard to believe…Could you, if and when you have time, point me to any reports etc. regarding HIV prevalance? Thanks.
Sujatha, I keep reading reports about HIV – will def email you whenever I come across anything or when I manage to source something I have read – for now, I can only shamelessly point out to you some old posts of mine on the AIDS issue in India – check out under the ‘public health’ category – have linked to some good reports in some of these posts…
I have had the same experiences on the PTC buses. As for the Boys comment – the primary and most vulgar offenders were not young 17 – 22 year olds but the 40 to 60 year dirty old swines. This whole morality concept has been getting more skewed by the day. I am with Kushboogals, if you are going to do it, do it safely! All else: wake up and smell the coffee.
potsally, kno what you mean by the older ones being the worst kinds. they also have the “benefit of doubt” if they are caught – naan unnoda anna /appa maadiri – ya, right.
Ammani,
Your opinion abut Chennai being more dangerous compared to Mumabi sounds ridiculous. I fail to understand the basis on which you made this statement. It is unfortunate if you had been molested but that does not prove that Chennai is worse in comparison to Mumbai. Please check the crime rate and especially crime against wome, Mumbai tops the list nt juct compared to Chennai but most of Siuth Indian states. The easy thing for any one born in Chennai to do is to go outside Chennai and keep throwing brickbats on it.. You are no exception. Your “high” opinions on Mumbai compared to Chennai is just your own wish and not a general public opinion.
These so called modern people will make sex a common breakfast-lunch kind of thing in few years. Probably self control is what differentiates us from animals before marriage. And itss safe too in times of HIV to abstanin from casual bingss. Letss feel proud of our culture and not imitate West or even very vocal modern delhi and mumbai stars.