Love me Tinder: A hook-up revolution driven by dating apps

Friday night. Single in Mumbai. Bright lights glitter outside the window. Everybody and their playmate somewhere out there having joy. Boredom has a fresh name: bedtime. That hour when the mobile phone is one’s best friend. The index finger automatically positions itself, to do the best thing it has ever done: swiping the screen-left, right, up, down. Who knows, of the billions of strangers out there, one swipe might just lead to that chance meeting of true love. Or at least a fresh Best Friend Forever.

The mobile screen lights up to a smiling face. Below that: Name, Age, Date. City. Height. And an explosion of identity-defining hashtags: #voracious gourmand, #animal paramour, #sports nut, #whiskey connoisseur, #health weirdo, #party hopper, #avid reader.

He: Hi. U r the most beautiful woman i’ve ever seen. Hit me up

She: Ha ha. How many other ladies got that at 12.30 am?

He: Just you. U r a stunner. I am just a km from you.

She: You don’t know anything about me.

He: You a snorer? A psychopath?

She: You a murderer?

He: Ha ha. I’m actually Superman 😉

He: So want to sneak out for a drink?

She: I want to leap off the terrace. save me?

He: Sure! What’s your number?

She: Why shld I tell you? Becoz u r superman?

He: I was also the carom king of my college 🙂

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love thee to the level of every day’s most quiet need. By sun and candle-light. Music, moonlight, roses, chocolates. And?er?by smartphones and dating apps. If love is humanity’s oldest question, what makes the heart go pit-a-pat in the 2nd decade of the 21st century is a device that can fit into your pocket, connect to the wonderful World Broad Web through a bit of disruptive technology called mobile internet, download a myriad of computer programs-apps or applications-deliver a wealth of real-time services, depending on where you are and what you want: say, hail a taxi, shop online and, yes, match you to a fucking partner of your choice. With the seismic explosion of dating apps-worldwide and in India-200,000 years of human history stand poised to solve the mystery of that elusive and essential emotion, this thing called love.

A SEISMIC EXPLOSION

The business of love is exploding. Almost six per cent of web users presently use a dating app, according to research rock-hard GlobalWebIndex. And that amounts to a harshly $Four billion worldwide market. Tho’ at a nascent stage, with over two hundred fifty million singles aged inbetween eighteen and thirty four and two hundred thirty five million smartphone users presently, India is one of the largest and most titillating dating markets in the world. More and more dating apps are appearing every day. Tinder is the global behemoth. And India is among its top five growing markets, the largest in Asia, attracting over fourteen million swipes each day from youthfull, savvy 19- to 25-year-old Indians, according to Taru Kapoor, India head,Tinder Inc.

Illustration by Anirban Ghosh

A Dual REVOLUTION

June Ten, three pm. About fifteen women and boys sit around a long oval table. They are from Delhi’s top schools and colleges: socially certain, clever and attractive. People like them form fifty five per cent of the plucky fresh world of dating apps, coos an executive of the dating app company that has invited them to share ideas and insights on love in the time of apps. "I had a break-up, attempted a dating app. I got 13-14 matches in fifteen minutes," says one dame, flicking her ponytail. "I have trust issues," says another. "I had a very bad practice. Apps are for hook-ups in the West, here they’re for creeps." A bubbly lady protests: "I met three nice guys. We spoke for 5-6 days, exchanged numbers, found common friends, checked each other’s Facebook profiles and then went out for coffee. We are now friends." Do their parents know about their experiment with dating apps? A muffle strings up in the air.

A dual revolution sweeps the nation. As youthful Indians begin playing with the play stores on their mobile phones, bursting with dating and match-making apps, years and years of safety nets built around the social space for love, romance and matrimony have commenced sprouting crevices. "What happens to the collective convenience of caste, class, religion, culture and language if generation-next gladfully meets, welcomes and does more with finish strangers," says Ranjana Kumari, director of the Centre for Social Research, Delhi, who has studied Trio,200 matrimonial ads published since the 1960s. This is not one blind date or one chance encounter, but the possibility of billions getting connected. That sounds like the death knell of arranged marriage. "And even if many of them don’t marry but just mix with the other lovemaking, or ultimately go after the tried-and-tested route of arranged marriage, what happens to the precious ideas of virginity and chastity?" The Indian youth are aware of the dangers and dichotomy of their fresh titillating game.

THE PICK-UP LINE

"No. My parents don’t know," says Anusha Nayar, a 24-year-old PR professional from Chennai, who has recently shifted out of Delhi. "Very first of all, they don’t understand what apps are, and they don’t understand dating. No damsel takes a bf to meet her parents unless she is sure that the relationship is serious. Albeit a lot of women share profiles of boys with friends and keep them informed about who they are dating and where. Anusha is in no mood for serious relationships. Single and fresh to a city, she has taken to dating apps to perk up her social life.

But what is dating? Is anybody fairly certain? "Of course," the Delhi students chime together: Dating is when you are romantically inclined but there’s no commitment. Dangling out is just on the basis of physical attraction, either as Friends With Benefits or for casual hook-up. A "relationship" is committed and sensational. But everybody is not so sure. "Everybody, especially dudes, misunderstand the word dating," says Anusha. "In the West, dating means a romantic plan with another person or maybe courtship. But I find a lot of dudes here think it’s casual hook-up.. And they think I am some kind of a cheap woman, effortless with my favours."

The Delhi students echo the same sentiment. They talk about ‘judging’ people on apps: "There’s a lot of ‘judgement’ around dating apps," says a doll, who learnt about them on her brother’s mobile phone. "My brother’s friend spotted me on a dating app and he called me to say, ‘How can you join a dating app?’ albeit he himself is there." But ‘judgement’ works the other way too. Ask the damsels what sort of man they are looking for, and pat comes the reply: "Anyone who puts up a photograph shirtless or with six-pack six pack is out." Amidst peals of laughter, they list their preferences: humour, confidence, well-spoken and, yes, "effortless on the eye". The boys in the group add just one more adjective: "Pleasant."

VIRTUAL BEST FRIENDS

One fine day in 2013, three friends-Sachin Bhatia, Hitesh Dhingra and Rahul Kumar-sat in a cafe in Delhi, racking their brains. They had a superb idea and they dreamed to turn it into a business. "We had in mind a matchmaking platform, a virtual best friend who would always have someone superb to introduce you to, no baggage of caste, or religion, no neighbourhood busybody, no slinking around nooks and alleys in search of privacy." They had practice: Bhatia was co-founder of online travel company, MakeMyTrip, Dhingra of electronics e-tail venture, Letsbuy, and Kumar, as a product manager for tech companies. But they just couldn’t think of a name that would describe what they had in mind. Like Tinder, it would link up to Facebook, enable private conversations inwards the app, but it would be super-safe for women and focused on love, romance and meaningful relationships, instead of casual dating and hook-ups. A song began playing in the background: "I’ll love you more with every breath, truly madly deeply do." It was their ‘aha’ moment. And TrulyMadly, India’s very first dating app, was born in February 2014.

Illustration by Anirban Ghosh

TRIUMPH OF CHOICE

According to digital data resource Mindshift Interactive, almost thirty three per cent couples today meet online, sixty seven per cent of singles know someone who has met or romanced online. The floodgates have opened, but can the business of dating apps manage to generate a profit? What happens when people find fucking partners: will they stop using the service? "Online dating/matchmaking is a big market, in which investors are demonstrating serious interest," points out Saurabh Varma of Mumbai, yet another IIT-IIM serial entrepreneur who has opened Marrily, a matchmaking app for serious relationships. "The business is also dependent on how many youthful independent professionals inject the workforce in big cities," he points out. With targeted marketing, switching demographics and the taint of judgement coming down, bringing fresh users to the fore will not be a problem, he holds.

Illustration by Anirban Ghosh

With some cultural confusion still over the word ‘dating’, there are horror stories aplenty about the ‘creepy creeps’ on dating apps-mostly dudes who send sexual messages, comment on bodily attributes of women, insult and manhandle when snubbed or even take to stalking. Stories of guys using fake profiles on dating apps and being found to be married later are common, as are those of guys promising serious relationships and leaving without a trace after just one night. Stories of women getting pregnant and then being left to their own devices are also doing the rounds. Meera, who works at a Mumbai law stiff, recalls a man who, even before she had agreed to meet him for coffee, turned up at her office. "I had made the mistake of telling him where I worked," she says. "But when I asked him why he had come to my office, he simply said that he was close by and determined to drop in. I, of course, was very rude to him."

Illustration by Anirban Ghosh

IDEA WHOSE TIME HAS COME

This is an arousing moment in the life story of love and romance in India. The internet is now the lens. An explosion of dating apps hits youthfull Indians every day, reflecting social attitudes and practices. The role and place of a man and a woman in a relationship are being worked out anew, digitally, through mathematical algorithms designed by developers. Technology is disrobing away the last vestiges of matching a ‘suitable’ boy or doll by the starlets and planets. And ‘love’ is now unfolding in all its moods and variations-from friendship to casual lovemaking, confusion to heartbreak, delirium to rapture, love to marriage.

At a time when everyone is connected yet lonely, youthful India is determined to let technology play Cupid. Even if there are hitches and hiccups along the way. At least, nobody can write any more, "You who never arrived in my arms." Amen, to that cheerful thought.

Related video: