Too sexy for my chiffon

The other day I stumbled upon this delightful post by a friend:

…I think there are two kinds of men: Ones who like women in white chiffon sarees and the ones who like women in red/yellow/blue chiffon sarees.

Wonder why men can't endorse khadi and organic cotton in their dream sequences?

I was shaking my head and laughing to myself when I tried to visualise a Kareena Kapoor swaying in a khadi saree. Put Kareena in khadi and you de sexualise her completely.

What is the connection really between fantasy, the Indian way, and chiffons?

History says, India was among the first countries to grow cotton and use it to weave cloth. It was sometime during the Harappan era. Fantasies would have existed before that, isn't it? Going by the erotic carvings of the Khajuraho temple, the drape on the female form was meant to enhance her natural form, it could be cotton or silk. Most of the time, it was simply strategically worn body jewellery.

But the flowing saree around a sensuous female form was perhaps immortalised by Raja Ravi Varma, whose women were as much an object of fantasy as they were instantly recognisable.

Women who crowded the average Indian male's fantasy, did not wear chiffons till recently. They oozed desirability in muslins and silks. What made them sexy, was the way they draped the saree, the pallu and the blouse. The blouse, and the absence of it at times, made all the difference. And the mischievous pally only fuelled the fantasy.

The chiffon fantasy is definitely a Bollywood invention. A woman in a sheer chiffon saree has been a favourite trope with filmmakers of a certain sensibility. But only till the time the dramatic personae were not married. Whenever you had the first glimpse of the woman in a chiffon saree or dupatta, you knew it was a cue to a seduction sequence. It worked beautifully against lush meadows and snowy mountain slopes. In the rain and on a windy terrain.

For over five decades, if not more, Bollywood made us believe, that the women you put the girl-next-door in a chiffon saree, you turn up the heat. Moment the characters were married, the woman switched to silks and cottons, worn the conservative way.

It all changed of course in 2003. The year the Noodle Strap stormed into our national lexicon and cricket crazy men stayed up all night wondering what Mandira Bedi would wear next. Bedi made the saree redundant. It did not matter whether she wore a FabIndia saree (which she didn't actually) or a Kanjeevaram. The noodle strap was the star of the show.

My friend, whose Facebook post inspired me to write this piece, endorses the saree at work and at play. She has a lovely collection of handloom and organic cotton sarees and manages to look stunning every time she drapes them. Far more sensuous than her colleagues in their hot pants and slinky dresses.

I think I know how. It's the way she drapes it, it is old-school sexy. And the blouse adds to the oomph, without being in-you-face kind of sexy. If she is reading this column, she should know, that with gorgeous women like her around, not all male fantasy has to be about done-to-death white and red chiffons. Cotton can be eye candy too.

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