One of the best scenes that Karan Johar has shot was perhaps the one leading to the climax of the 2018 Netflix series Lust Stories when Kiara Advani’s character experiences her first orgasm with the help of a vibrator — in front of her in-laws. Scandalous, sensational, scintillating.
It was this scene that had made Kriti Sanon — Johar’s first choice — turn down the role. To talk of female pleasure so openly on the big screen was perhaps a complete no-no for the film industry. But women in advertising have been screaming their need for sexual pleasure for two decades now.
In the Indian film landscape, female pleasure is still a largely unexplored topic, but one that condom brands have been exploring since the start of the millennia. A 2004 commercial for Moods Condoms focused on women wantonly staring at a couple enjoying their intimacy and exuding sexual chemistry.
Since then, women in advertising have become even more vocal about their needs.
Take, for instance, the 2023 Kama Sutra advertisement that featured a couple that’s about to check out from their hotel but keeps delaying it for an hour, two, then the entire day — indicating that condoms help the couple enjoy sex for longer.
It is these condom ads that have paved the way for Bold Care, a sexual health products brand co-founded by Ranveer Singh, to sell its products with clear and bold messaging.
This women’s day, we talk about women’s pleasure and thank Indian condom brands for being the first in the country to keep talking about it in a positive way.
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They keep getting better
Women in advertising are either trying to fix their insecurities, fulfilling their roles as dutiful wives or moms, or jumping around in white pants. That’s largely the advertising landscape across categories. But it is in the condom ads, where women take on agency. The modern, hot woman wants her needs met, and she is on equal terms with her partner. Brands know that they’re arguably the primary beneficiaries of the product that helps prevent pregnancies.
By making women-centric condom ads, and focusing exclusively on female pleasure, condom brands help spread awareness about the use of the product, and how women shouldn’t shy away from asking their partners to bring the rubber to the bed.
Indian condom ads keep getting better and better. They started with family planning and gradually evolved to show safe sex and now have been increasingly talking about female pleasure. It is good to see ads where the woman is not a placeholder or overly sexualised.
For a country whose sex culture is shrouded in shame, and where it’s taboo to talk about pleasure in the open, condom brands have played an important role in destigmatising sex for fun and moving on from sex for procreation. Condom ads in India are more about pleasure than precaution. Which is precisely what makes them great.
Evolution over the years
The first condoms to hit the markets in India were the government-manufactured Nirodh, the ads for which focused on family planning. One of the first ads showed a young woman, mother of a toddler, buying condoms when she goes for her monthly shopping. But even then condoms were focused as a ‘man’s product’. “Have you bought my product?” is what the husband asks the wife in a hushed tone.
But then Nirodh released an iconic ad that made condoms cool. A flirtatious couple is on their way home when the man loses the condom packet and then chases it all the way back. He’s called the ‘mukkadar ka sikandar’ for choosing to have safe sex.
Then in the mid-2010s, Manforce advertised its products by heavily sexualising the woman to the point that it became difficult to differentiate a condom ad from a men’s deodorant ad. Sunny Leone was chosen as the brand ambassador. Although the aim was to arouse the male audience, the focus was largely on female pleasure.
Ads for Playgard condoms also featured an intimate couple, getting hot and heavy. A Durex ad featuring Ranveer Singh also became a pathbreaker — here was a mainstream movie star, advertising condoms and sexual freedom.
What stands out about the Kama Sutra ad is that the pleasure of the couple has been replaced by the pleasure of the woman. Previous ads only focused on the duration of sex, not female pleasure, which is perhaps most affected because of short, if not premature sex.
We need more such sex-positive messaging, especially as the use of condoms in India remains extremely low. Over to other brands to tell us what all a condom can bring to bed for a woman. If safety isn’t enough to encourage people to use condoms, sensuality should be.
Views are personal.
(Edited by Humra Laeeq)