India is a sexually deprived country where discussing anything to do with sex is considered taboo and parents will rarely teach their children about hormonal changes happening in their bodies and stuff related to sex. So most children get knowledge about sex either from their peers or the internet. Despite sex being considered taboo in India, when it comes to porn, Indians are one of the leading consumers of porn globally. In 2017-2018 when OTT platforms started operating in India, Indians accepted it wholeheartedly because, unlike other countries, mostly the west, Indians have very few modes of entertainment. For a typical middle-class family in India going to a movie, watching TV and surfing are the main sources of India, so when OTT platforms like Netflix, Prime Video, Disney + Hotstar, etc arrived in India, they became famous, especially among the youth from Urban cities of India.
But what about the people of tier 2, tier 3 cities, and rural areas who could not connect to the shows that are streaming on those OTT Platforms and that is where OTT platforms with erotic web series came into the picture. ALT Balaji was the first which noticed the huge gap between cities and small towns, and villages when it comes to subscribing to video streaming service providers. ALT Balaji then released India’s first erotic web series Gandi Baat in 2018 which became quite famous. After the success of Gandi Baat, many OTT platforms came and made web series titles like Open Marriage, Maya Memsaab, Love in Lockdown, Mastram, Kavita Bhabhi, etc were blatantly displayed on the homepages of OTT platforms, Indian streaming platforms engaged in the production and distribution of erotic online content are now the source of voyeuristic pleasure for millions of users.
Many video streaming platforms like Ullu, Kooku, GupChup, PrimeFlix, Hotshots, Flizmovies, etc came into existence. They gave people exactly what they need, semi-porn web series with a minimal storyline that mainly focused on bold scenes. The consumption of such contents increased many folds during the Corona Pandemic which was followed by a nationwide lockdown. According to a survey app downloads for these platforms numbered between 100,000 and 1 million on Google Play Store which is simply unbelievable. These web series gave chances to struggling actors especially female actors who have no qualms doing bold scenes. Some of the most popular names in this industry are Jinnie Jazz, Pihu Singh, Taniya Chatterjee, Aayushi Jaiswal, Anushka Srivastava, Jyostna Trivedi, Manvi Chugh, etc. Not only strugglers but already know the actress who acted in TV serials also featured in such web series and Shafaq Naaz is a prime example of it who played the role of Kunti in Star Plus’s Mahabharat.
Most female actors working in such web series are models who wanted to get into the line of acting. Mumbai is a costly city and working in such web series paid them well it’s also one of the reasons that there is no dearth of actors and actresses working in these web series. If we analyze why these web series are becoming so famous, the first thing is that they come for very low subscription fees, second India is a sexually deprived country, these web series gave viewers direct access to erotic series and since there is no censoring when it comes to web series, these streaming services can show whatever they intend without facing any legal issues. At last, we conclude that the future of these erotic web series is going to increase especially in tier 2 and 3 cities.
