Literary Horizon An International Peer-Reviewed English Journal Vol. 1, Issue 1 www.literaryhorizon.com February, 2021 Shagless Marriage and Rationing Sex Dr. Vipan B Kumar Advocate, Mumbai High Court, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India. Physical intimacy and sexuality including coitus is an essential ingredient which is an integral part of matrimony and cements marital relationship. It is the elixir of life and an invigorating force that makes life worth living with enthusiasm and bonding. Generally, most of us take sexual relationship for granted by virtue of one‘s marriage to our spouse or due to natural intimacy that couples develop as a result of interpersonal interaction. However, nurturing of sexual intimacy is often not considered as a conscious effort, gradually paving the way for problems by influx of time, erosion of novelty, increasing responsibilities and various other factors. The word ―sex‖ and sexuality topics are a taboo and inhibiting in our society and culture, so much so that even healthy and normal discussion on it is considered to be indecent, restrictive and uncomfortable. The irrational beliefs and myths related to sexuality continues to be reinforced and go unchallenged, strengthening resistance and diffidence with respect to sex, even between couples, who are generally adults and in committed relationship or married. Sexual knowledge and information is generally informally acquired and not appropriately channelised in many cases, giving rise to misinformation, irrational beliefs and myths that not only are a cause of many medical and psychological concerns as well as legal issues but also causes irreparable damage to interpersonal relationships, erodes the charm of intimacy, married life and various relationships that are dependent on it or arising out of it. Contact No. +91-8331807351 Page 121 Email: [email protected] Literary Horizon An International Peer-Reviewed English Journal Vol. 1, Issue 1 www.literaryhorizon.com February, 2021 Coitus and sexuality are closely associated with and boosted by many factors which may include but are not limited to one‘s beliefs, values, preferences, habits, communication skills, interpersonal interaction, temperamental factors, perception, thoughts, etc. Sex between two individuals should be voluntary, healthy, satisfactory and acceptable to both the participating individuals if it has to be fun and relaxing activity. It should always be a fun-filled and engrossing activity that is devoid of compulsion, anxiety and stress. However, human relationships are a mixture of complex emotions, each impinging on them in varying degrees at a given period of time. Synchronizing and regulating various emotions with relationship and intimacy is a skill which unfortunately many of us has never been taught or ever have we made attempts to learn and understand this art, which we often wrongly assume as a natural process and in most cases take it for granted, thereby laying the foundation of interpersonal conflict and dissatisfaction. The subjective dissatisfaction in the area of sexual relationships largely arises from non- sexual factors but the cleavage of this conflict and its escalation is seen in the bed and effect‘s one‘s sexual functioning as well as satisfaction, gradually paving the way for death knell of a matrimonial bond. Sexual activity is the barometer of intimacy and a healthy matrimonial bond. It is a reflection of one‘s emotional state and psychological adjustment. A disturbance in sexual activity is an indicator that one‘s mental state needs attention and an expert intervention so that corrective steps can be taken to nip the damaging effects and spill over of this problem on other relationships. There are a growing number of clients whom we encounter in our regular practice whose presenting complaints include unconsummated marriage, shagless marriage or a matrimonial issue where one spouse uses sex as a manipulation tool to vent resentment, frustration or fulfill some ulterior motives. In few cases, one spouse may not be interested in sex or sexual activity Contact No. +91-8331807351 Page 122 Email: [email protected] Literary Horizon An International Peer-Reviewed English Journal Vol. 1, Issue 1 www.literaryhorizon.com February, 2021 where as other spouse would be high on sexual appetite. This mismatch gets not only the couple, but also their families in legal quagmire which is not easily resolved. One of my colleagues, who happened to be my client, came with a presenting complaint that her husband, a President of a leading software company and having a history of extramarital affairs was a flirt and had another new affair with her Office Assistant. On deeper analysis, after couple counseling, with great difficult it surfaced that his was a sexless marriage where the wife had a low libido, high unrealistic, moralistic standards and certain irrational beliefs with regard to sexuality, whereas the husband was high on sexual desire and his sexual needs were not fulfilled. Moreover he, as opposed to his educated doctorate wife, was innovative and Experimentative with regard to sexuality. It was a herculean task to lower wife‘s defenses and irrational beliefs associated with sexuality. Through Socratic questioning, enlightenment gradually dawned on her and she did feel, after few counseling sessions, that there was a need for her to change considerably. One question posed to her was the game changer. She was asked to rate on a scale of 01 to 10 her need for sex and desire to indulge in it and related activities as well as rate for her husband the same. She chose 03 for her and 10 for her husband. She was then questioned as to ―how her husband, will fulfill the said gap of 07?‖. It is this gap that is one of the major causes of his extramarital affair and other related acts. After multiple periodic counseling sessions, not only was the litigation installed and withdrawn but their sexual functioning and subjective satisfaction, at least for wife, increased considerably over a period of next few months. It was considerable challenge to explain to the said client by a team of Psychologists to introduce variety and novelty in sex and lowering her judgmental nature and moralistic inhibitions during having intimate contacts with her spouse. Sexual difficulties such as painful coitus also called as dyspareunia or vaginismus, aversion to sex, low sexual desire, premature ejaculation, erectile dysfunction or any other type of sexual dysfunction, can be easily corrected through proper medical and psychological Contact No. +91-8331807351 Page 123 Email: [email protected] Literary Horizon An International Peer-Reviewed English Journal Vol. 1, Issue 1 www.literaryhorizon.com February, 2021 intervention, provided it is noted early and both the spouses or partners decide to jointly approach the concerned specialist at the earliest, without indulging in blame game and accusations against each other leading to any further conflict or deterioration of their interpersonal relationships. Sexual difficulties which are in the nature of manipulation, such as sex strike, rationing of sex, withholding sex for long duration, is a result of poor handling of the interpersonal conflict or due to personality factors and psychological issues either related to one spouse or to both of them. The conduct of one spouse in using sex as a tool to manipulate the other is a serious issue that damages the matrimonial bond and needs urgent expert intervention. It also has considerable legal implications. Sex Strike or sex boycott is not new and has ancient roots. It is a theme of the famous comedy play Lysistrata by Aristophanes dating back to 411 B.C(1). In this play it is depicted that a middle class housewife from Athenes organises women from various Greek City States to strike sex as a means to negotiate peace and end the Peloponnesian War. More recently, American actress Alyssa Milano advocated sex strike, through a tweet, by urging women to stop having sex until bodily autonomy is granted to women(2). Her tweet was a protest against strict abortion bans. Sex strike when it occurs at a purely individual level in one‘s bedroom, due to stupid reason such as not shaving one‘s armpit or pubic hair, not wearing a particular brand of undergarment, compelling the spouse to give up a particular perfume or cream as its smell is not appreciated, snapping ties with one‘s sister or with a particular friend whom your spouse does not like or any other idiosyncratic and irrational condition imposed by one spouse on the other is highly damaging and detrimental to any intimate relationship including marriage. Its repeated use and prolonged extension can take legal recourse and end of a relationship. A somewhat related issue is of shagless marriage, unconsummated marriage or prolonged absence of sex in a marriage. As a result of such condition, not only is the intimacy weakened but relationships crumble beyond repair which cannot be salvaged even by the protection of the Contact No. +91-8331807351 Page 124 Email: [email protected] Literary Horizon An International Peer-Reviewed English Journal Vol. 1, Issue 1 www.literaryhorizon.com February, 2021 law. Indian as well as courts everywhere in the world has dissolved sexless marriage, especially unconsummated marriage, irrespective of its cause. A sexless marriage is one in which there has been no sexual activity during the past one year or less than 10 sexual encounters in a year, whereas the average norm as per different studies ranges between 58 to 67. Apex Court in the case of Vidhya Viswanathan vs. Kartik Balakrishnan, AIR 2015 SC 285,(3) has held that not allowing a spouse for long time to have sexual intercourse by his or her partner, without sufficient reason, itself amounted to mental cruelty to such spouse and the said marriage needs dissolution. Similar view has also been taken in the case of Samar Gosh vs Jaya Ghosh (2007) 4 SCC 511(4).