New Delhi, April 24 (IANS) Bollywood's newest star Sunny Leone is a big draw here and so are MMS clips of various sex scandals and porn scenes and the newly available sex toys smuggled from China.
Even as Parliament Monday hotly debated rising rapes and "depravity" in society and demands to check spread of pornographic material, it seems porn was for the asking literally down the road.
Notoriously famous for being the capital's "porn hub", Palika Bazar, the underground shopping complex in Connaught Place, is witnessing a new clientele as teenaged school and college students are giving way to labourers, rickshaw pullers and daily-wage workers who are thronging the market for cheap and easily accessible porn.
This IANS correspondent visited the market in the business heart of Delhi and the shopkeepers admitted that advancements in technology and the decline in the number of affluent customers have given way to this new breed of shoppers who are looking for cheap entertainment.
"People who have laptops and internet don't come here anymore. It is the labour class which is driving the sales," said a shopkeeper on the first floor of the market, refusing to reveal his name.
According to shopkeepers, with easy access to internet at homes and on mobile phones, affluent customers, from the middle and upper middle class have declined gradually.
"They (labourers) are not teach-savvy nor do they have the money, so they get all the masala (porn clips) downloaded in their phones," said his associate seated at the counter with a laptop in front of him that had the image of Indo-Canadian adult actress Sunny Leone in a skimpy dress as the background.
"Her clips are the most in demand," said the man pointing to Leone, who gained fame after her appearance in the fifth season of the Bigg Boss reality show.
Armed with budget brand cellphones which cost anywhere between Rs. 800 to Rs.2,000 with big screens for better video playback and expandable memory, the new category of customers can have access to porn 24X7 without the fuss of owning a CD player and a TV.
Moreover, the thumbnail sized memory card, loaded with hundreds of porn clips or movies, is easy to conceal in a wallet and used when required as against stacks of CDs and DVDs.
The shopkeepers can download hundreds of clips on the memory card ranging from 2 GB to 10 GB for anywhere between Rs.100 to 400 depending on the clips as well as bargaining skills.
Though the categories of the clips vary, the shopkeepers say it is the MMS clips, some real and some staged, which are the most favourite. Such clips are often shot in hotel rooms, hostels or cars with or without the consent of the couples in it.
"Kand (scandals) are the most in demand," said another shop owner to IANS with a leering smile and almost snatched my mobile phone from my hand, eager to fill it up with 'kands' at a "decent" price.
The market, however has not been completely forgotten by its loyal affluent customers, who according to shopkeepers, have moved beyond CDs and are into buying sex toys, most of which are smuggled from China.
Inflatable dolls, dildos, vibrators and even sex gums which claim to work like Viagra are easily available at several shops. All you have to do is ask.
Some shops have even put the toys up on display on glass shelves to cater to timid customers.
According to police reports, the two men behind the heinous gangrape of a five-year-old in Delhi last week had watched porn in an inebriated state just before kidnapping the child and raping her.
(Rahul Vaishnavi can be contacted at rahul.v@ians.in)
