Decoding consent

Happenings, Mar '16
Cracking the consent conundrum was the focus of a panel discussion organized by Civilian Welfare Foundation, Kinky Collective and Varta Trust last month in Kolkata. Pompi Banerjee reports

Kolkata, February 20, 2016: Nearly 30% out of 71 people felt that the age of sexual consent in India should be 15 years. Almost 25% agreed that long-term intimate partners need not explicitly seek verbal consent every time they wanted to have sex with each other, another 30% were undecided. Among those who clearly disagreed with this statement, there were far more women than men. Not saying no or not resisting advances implies consent for sex – only 54% of the audience disagreed with this statement. Consent for sex can be withdrawn at any point of time – 79% agreed, but 21% did not or were undecided, which was equally worrying!

Photo credit: Arunabha Hazra

Salt, pepper and sex – on the table!

Creations, Jan '16
Pawan Dhall in conversation with advocate Kaushik Gupta, 44 and physician Dr. Archan Mukherjee, 33, both photography enthusiasts and creators of Colours of Love in . . . Monochrome, 2016, somewhat plain-sounding but easily the ‘hottest’ calendar in town – displaying it on your table may well call for revisiting and confronting your ideas about gender, sexuality and sexual pleasure

Photographs courtesy: Colours of Love in . . . Monochrome, 2016

Pawan: Before we flip through the calendar, let’s hear something about the creators.

Archan: I’m a photo artist and a doctor (Master of Public Health) and teach in a medical college – I travel between Kolkata and Durgapur for work.

Pawan: How did the combination of doctor and photo artist come about?