Why Do So Many Indian Men Cheat?

oh i did not know india was such a heaven….india here i come!!

totally agree here!!! its happening in india, not only big cities ,everywhere !!! If you look at it many perspective there are many social aspect …..but I don’t agree its the “restricted” attitudes towards sex in our society is the reason behind it. If it is true then, those “restrictions” were there always.Look back time, generation go and ask grand fathers or somthing they will tell you at their time “this much” moral degradation was not there in our society….so what is the reason now??? ……..I can give you few…but won’t be right if I wright all those here……..

Indian men don’t know how to date they are socially awkward with girls and women all their life there are very few that would actually be suave. They don’t take Rejection very well and have to please their parents and all that crap. People in India Get married too early and don’t grow up enough by travel or experiencing new thing to know actually what they want. when i moved from New york to Bombay the culture shock was eminent and guys would think i was in love with them or was coming on to them just because i was being nice and cordial. They need to grow up and cut the umbilical cord that wraps around their neck. hope u meet the Suave exception:) i prefer the shy not mommas boys myself all the best

Wow, some great comments here, especially love the equal mix of men to women entering into the topic. From my limited experience so far in India I still think it has more to do with unhappy marriages like a few people have mentioned above (either marrying too early, arranged marriages with no chemistry, etc).

@Harry … seriously? Because I write about dancing bans, relationships, moustaches and diverse other topics then that makes me a predator? You are way off base with your judgement of my behaviour (or personality) but even so, the handsome ones hit on me too so there’s really no need for me to take on that role even if it was my style…

Infidelity is common and increasingly becoming popular. One can’t really pinpoint at a particular reason for that: hardships of life, conservative culture and upbringing, arranged marriages and an upwardly changing lifestyle of the middle class. Till a few years ago, socializing was more or less a taboo. I feel, aspirations to be more modern and western also lead to such scenarios. Actually, the whole basis of the western culture is quite misunderstood in our country, unfortunately. And btw, women are no less. Anyway, till you find a sensible, sane and matured company, enjoy the socializing and good luck with the brushing off!! There still are some good guys out there.

Hi Angela,

I am an Indian guy.You have an interesting post up. Although, I feel that to call Indian men naughty would be going too far, I think it is rather a case of Indian men being socially inept to cover up their intentions. One night stands and guys hitting on girls just for the sex, and blah blah happens everywhere in the world, only the people are more suave and you could say better groomed and indirect and so “respectful”. So it is about Indian ,men being socially inept than naughtier as such.

Indians cheat more is an overstatement. I concede that well, many upper-middle class and upper class men might be cheaters but India is majorly made up of the lower middle class, family oriented men, who work their ass off for their families. I don’t think they have the time or the energy to go to 5 stars or other “romantic” dates. So to go on to say the Indian’s are cheaters isn’t very factual. The fact of the matter is most Indian men belong to the lower middle class and are very family oriented and would maybe I guess, be less prone to cheating.

I don’t know why no friend of your’s has mentioned it to you, but I’ll break it to you that in India, given the culture and the norms, a bar would be the least probable place to be picked up at by good men in India. I think you could meet better guys at other places. Even those who drink and are more “Western” in outlook and might have similar interests as you would go to other places than bars and clubs, where you should find them.

Well you were in the US,and well the president, Bill Clinton, the first person of the country, cheated!! Does that mean anything for other Americans ? I do not think so. Generalization is something we all humans are great at but it isn’t good.

Cheers.

If arranged marriages are to be blamed for high rate of cheating in India, Pray what do you attribute the high rate of cheating in the US? Non arranged marriages?
Could it be that men are men irrespective of citizenship?
Also, did you not get any attention in the US? What do you attribute the over 50% divorce rate in the US to?

@Maddie, good points. I was married to a Spaniard and we lived in Barcelona, Spain (I have lived outside the U.S. longer than in it as an adult and I haven’t set foot in the U.S. in a decade) so I don’t think I’m the best person to answer your questions but I am sure lots of readers here could

Interesting take there…I mean there are so many dimensions to cheating that the whole thing becomes an interesting study …I sometimes feel that everyone cheats or atleast most people do…it is just that some get the opportunity and use it…while others wake up late and a few others wait for a better offer..:) just my two pennies…

Why Indian? I think all men cheat and most women do too. I think mammals are polygamous not sure of many exceptions to this rule. But man has set some social standards to this. The advent of Christianity was very important to condone polygamous behavior, which was otherwise prevalent in much of Rome and Greece.

Now Indian men have all their decisions made for them by family or by parents, hence the tendency to rebel indiscreetly is high and cheating forms a big part of that equation. These are usually men with very low self esteem.

I also think that CHOCOLATE brought up some excellent points. I would also agree that most cheating happens in middle and upper class unions, and the vast majority of Indians don’t fall into this category.

You have inspired some fantastic comments on a very relevant issue. Thanks!

Years ago, we Indians used to say these same things about foreigners! That’s right! All of em, no matter which part of the world you are from! Now it is really funny to hear someone else say this about us! Guess this is what “development” means! hehe!!!

Angela, I guess a lot of ‘White’ women living in India would have similar tales to tell. Fascination with ‘fair’ skin and the tendency to consider foreigners ‘loose’ might explain why you get hit on as frequently as you do. Would be interesting to get the ‘hit ratio’ (single: committed men)and frequency of propositioning from single Indian women to compare. They may have a different story to tell. How Indian men compare with those of other countries would still remain open. I think we need a survey and maybe some qualitative research to really find out. I’d also be interested in knowing whether men of foreign origin in India get hit on by Indian women (my guess is they do more than their Indian counterparts) and the ‘hit ratio’ of Indian women hitting on them. Indian men may not have too much data to share on that one though!

I think its not just men in India, but its men in general who have a tendency to cheat. And these days women are no saints either.

Its a matter of personal values and integrity. And those who cant hold high on them, if given a chance would tend to get involved in infidelity. India has a conservative culture, but despite that the tendency to cheap has always been common. Maybe it wasnt as apparent and open as it is now.

Society at large has loosen its thought about it. Earlier it was not that acceptable, but now its easier to cheap, get divorced, find a new person and still be acceptable in your social circles. Just that much has changed. Instead of closed doors, things are coming out of doors.

Very true about the white Fixation in India all the Whitening Ads should be a clue and they also think that if ur not Indian or an Indian origin living abroad all ur life u are of loose Morals I strongly disagree with both even though I come out on the good nd of the whole obsession with Fair and lovely I couldn’t be more against it. Beauty has nothing to do with COLOR

Interesting views. But I am not sure about the accuracy. Possibly foriegn women have a greater propensity to attract these kind of men. So you possibly have a greater probability of meeting such men, which makes you think there are a greater percentage of these men. Indian women are considered conservative and a man is likely to get into serious trouble if he makes these approaches to an unknown Indian women. Foriegn women on the other hand may be perceived to be more liberal and easy. Also the percentage of Indian men you find in these clubs is much less than those abroad. Hardly anyone in my social circle in India ever goes to clubs/parties (other than office ones). On the other hand, almost everyone in my social circle abroad go partying. In fact to date I myslef have never been to a club in India whereas I have been to clubs quite a few times when abroad.

@Raahila – you are too right…the night before my 1st day at work in India I was dying laughing in the hotel as I was using a self-tanner to try and darker up and look cooler like an Indian while I was watching TV…and advert after advet popped up (as I was still drying) for whitening creams. We all want what we can’t have I guess and the grasss IS always greener on the other side

@Tys – loved your comments. And the evolution of women through it (was worried about that as I started to read so thanks for capturing it). And yes, we all have conquest and to-do lists…whether mental (psychological!) or jotted down and “be with a white girl” probably factors onto some lists just like “see the great wall of China” or “sail down the Nile”

usually when you get stats on this kind of thing, its the men who claim more partners than women, but if there’s that many indian men cheating, they cant all be cheating with the same woman, so indian women must be doing a fair amount of cheating too.

What the fool & just another Indian man have said is what i have been thinking all along.This fascination for white skinned foreign girls,& the popular notion about them being liberal is responsible for the indecent proposals you receive.Therefore you can’t base any generalizations on that.For ex i have lived in this country for donkey’s years but am yet to receive such a proposal.

Interesting post but very very biased… we can’t expect anything better because you are a WOMAN. There are an equal number of women who cheat… not so openly like men but they do nevertheless. I would appreciate if you were to write an article about “Why (so many) women cheat.”
Of course men in other countries are so ’satisfied’ they don’t cheat at all.

Hi Angela,

Here are some facts. Convince yourself with some statistics. Your country leads the infidelity list
with 73%. You are in Bangalore since April 2011. How many Indian men have cheated you? The link is right at the bottom of posting

Which Country Has the Highest Rate of Infidelity

I have been getting a lot of visitors from all around the world.

Below is a list of countries that has brought the most traffic to my site Signs-of-a-Cheater.com with the top three below bringing the majority of the traffic.

1. United States (73%)

2. Canada (5%)

3. Russian Federation (5%)

4. Great Britain (UK)

5. Philippines

6. Australia

7. China

8. India

9. Germany

10. Netherlands

Is infidelity more of a problem in the US, Canada and Russia?

My site is currently too small to represent appropriate infidelity statistics around the world, but the topic is quite interesting.

Below is an excerpt from the Book, “Lust in Translation: Infidelity from Tokyo to Tennessee” (Penguin Books, 2007) by Pamela Druckerman.

Compared to the citizens of just about every other nation, Americans are the least adept at having affairs, have the most trouble enjoying them, and suffer the most in their aftermath and Pamela Druckerman has the facts to prove it.

The journalist’s surprising findings include:

• Russian spouses don’t count beach resort flings as infidelity

• South Africans consider drunkenness an adequate excuse for extramarital sex

• Japanese businessmen believe, “If you pay, it’s not cheating.”

The morning after François Mitterrand’s funeral, a photo showed the late president’s mistress and illegitimate daughter standing by his grave alongside his wife and sons. That tableau has become famous internationally as proof that the French are uniquely tolerant of extramarital affairs.

In fact, although French presidents seem to have an infidelity record approaching 100 per cent, ordinary Frenchmen claim to be quite faithful. In a 2004 national survey, just 3.8 per cent of married men and 2 per cent of women said they had had more than one sex partner in the past year (the best approximation of infidelity) — fewer than in similar surveys in the U.S. and the U.K.

If France isn’t the world capital of adultery, which country is? I set off around the world to find out.

I quickly discovered that global sex research is patchy and incomplete. Even serious researchers can’t even agree on what to call infidelity. Nigerians prefer the term “sexual networking.” The Finns use the morally neutral term “parallel relationships.” A French team uses an expression perhaps better suited for an accounting course: “simultaneous multi-partnerships.”

Then there’s the tricky matter of what constitutes cheating. A poll in one South African magazine had separate categories for men who cheat, and men who cheat “while drunk.” One American survey defined sex as “either vaginal or anal intercourse,” while another decided that sex is a “mutually voluntary activity with another person that involves genital contact and sexual excitement or arousal, that is, feeling really turned on, even if intercourse or orgasm did not occur.” Americans haven’t yet tried to count their so-called “emotional affairs,” in which the “cheaters” might never meet.

Many countries simply have no reliable sex statistics. National surveys are expensive, and many governments are either too prudish or too poor to help pay for them (private funding is seldom sufficient). America’s first representative national survey only got off the ground in the 1990s, after conservative members of Congress spent years trying to block it. Hints of Japan’s infidelity levels come only from the enormous size of the country’s paid-sex industry, which is famously frequented by married businessmen. A legal loophole permits a man and a woman to strike a private agreement for sex. Understandably, the state would rather not be confronted with the details.

In Russia, just talking about sex research can be hazardous. Soviet governments barely permitted any public discussion of sex, let alone a survey that might embarrass the government by showing that Russians were engaging in banned activities like extramarital affairs. And though the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Russia’s Orthodox church keeps the current government from funding practically anything related to sex.

“There were never and will not be in the foreseeable future national surveys,” said Igor Kon, a septuagenarian who’s Russia’s most prominent sexologist. When I visited him in Moscow, Kon showed me the pamphlet in which a group of Russian academics denounced him as a “danger to the Russian society and state” because of his calls for basic sex education and research. Earlier, hoodlums had attacked him while he delivered a lecture at Moscow University, and vandals defaced the door to his apartment. Kon was bothered least when he got a phone call threatening to bomb his apartment, since if the caller was serious Kon would already be dead. “To kill someone in Moscow is not a big problem,” he explained.

Despite the lack of hard data, in Russia and elsewhere there are facts on the ground. In Moscow, women in their forties told me that, by necessity, they only date married men. That’s because, since the life expectancy for Russian men has fallen so sharply (to 59) that by age 65 there are just 46 men left for every 100 women.

And it was clear that Russian men flaunted this demographic advantage. With the exception of a pastor (who was sitting with his wife at the time), I didn’t meet a single married man in Russia who admitted to being monogamous.

A family psychologist whom I had intended to interview as an “expert” boasted about her own extramarital relationships and insisted that given Russia’s endemic alcoholism, violent crime, and tiny apartments, affairs are “obligatory.”

Muslim countries tend to be even stricter about sex research. It’s impossible to know how much cheating goes on in places like Iran, where convicted adulterers can be stoned to death. But again there are facts — or at least impressions — on the ground. In Indonesia, the most populous Muslim country, the middle-class women and men I met said that adultery is absolutely wrong because the Koran forbids it. Then they revealed that many of their married friends, and sometimes they themselves, had lovers. In these circles, the attitude toward affairs seemed almost casual: local slang for a no-strings romp was “afternoon nap,” and a brief love affair was a “wonderful interval.”

I didn’t find evidence anywhere in the world that religious people are particularly faithful. Within the social circles I studied in Indonesia, the fact that polygamy is legal seemed to legitimize the idea that a man won’t be satisfied with just one woman. “Polygamy is something that induces adultery, because before they get married for the second time there’s a period of adultery,” said sociologist Paulus Wirutomo of the University of Indonesia. “Islam is not permissive, but there’s an emphasis on formality.”

I did find that, all over, money shapes the rules of infidelity. Men in rich countries are generally much more faithful than their counterparts in poor ones. That’s in part because first-world cheaters tend to be punished more severely. In America, a single affair can mean losing your marriage, your assets, your status and your self respect. Just 3.9 percent of married American men said they’d had more than one partner in the last year, according to the 2004 General Social Survey carried out by the National Opinion Research Center. Even in wealthy countries where the taboo on cheating is weaker than in the U.S. — Australia, Switzerland and Italy, for instance — husbands claim to be quite faithful too.

Among women, it’s just the opposite. Women in poor countries say they cheat infrequently, perhaps because they have less financial and social clout than their husbands. But in wealthier countries, where the status of men and women is more equal, levels of male and female infidelity — while still quite low — are fairly equal too.

While it’s impossible to get an exact measure of infidelity, there are some clues about where the most cheating goes on. Beginning in the 1990s, researchers tracking the spread of HIV began extensively mapping sexual behavior in sub-Saharan Africa. Their findings were astonishing: in the tiny West African nation of Togo, with a population of less than six million, 37 percent of married or cohabiting men said they’ve had more than one sex partner in the last year (the figure includes polygamists). Trailing just behind the Togolese were men in Cameroon, the Ivory Coast, Mozambique and Tanzania. In South Africa, even the AIDS educator at a Cape Town metal company told me that of course he had a girlfriend as well as a wife.

And so the dubious title of world infidelity capital goes to a region: sub-Saharan Africa. And with ordinary citizens cheating at such astonishing levels, one can only imagine what African politicians are up to. Surely they put even French presidents to shame.

Yes! Angela.

I have my own reasons for not entertaining too much traffic. There are times I am so busy attending to customers who needed their jobs the day before yesterday. I may not find time managing heavy traffic.

I just step in to write about my opinions to some postings.

I hope you understand.

Rajpriya

Hi Rajpria

What site do you run. I am intrested in what you have written because there is a lot of info I did not consider myself on this, when I have read variety of articles in past.

You do have very intresting and unique theory on the subject at hand, and I would love to know more.

CAN YOU PLEASE POST A LINK FOR ME.

HARRY

PS THANKS IN ADVANCE BEFORE I FORGET.

Hi Harry,

I donot run any sites for publc discussions or forums of my own. When I stumble upon sites like the NRI, I contribute my opinion.

I have read your comments. I work as a consultant serving the Digital Printing Industry who need assistance to get through to the ultimate printed product from the designing stage.

Rajpriya

@Rajpriya
Didn’t know you were a modern day ‘Abhimanyu.’
Of course, you wouldn’t have heard of the word. It was a clumsy attempt to coin a word (blog+heckling) to describe what you are doing to Angela.
A grandmother, eh? ‘Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale her infinite variety.’ The Bard is right as ever.