Rao said conservative groups across the country were being unrealistic about swiftly changing attitudes to sex among a new generation of Indian teenagers and were clinging stubbornly to an outmoded vision of the country's youth.

"There is much more permissiveness around today than a generation ago; young people are more aware of their sexuality," she said. "There is much greater access to information about sex from the Internet, from the cinema, from television.

"This generation needs to be much more knowledgeable, so that they are aware of the risks," she said.

"I have a feeling that the conservative elements in our society are unable to cope with these dynamic changes that are taking place. There is a fear that this area was once under their control and is now spiraling out of their control."

India has included sex education in its national curriculum since the late 1980s, but earlier course material gave little detail on contraception and sexually transmitted diseases and had no illustrations. The AIDS group maintained that with the epidemic spreading and with teenagers starting to have casual sex, the new course had to be clearer in certain areas.

A study by the group in 2006 showed that 8 percent of Indian teenagers had had casual sex; a less comprehensive survey conducted by the India Today weekly newsmagazine showed that one in four Indian women ages 18 to 30 who were questioned in 11 large cities had had sex before marriage.

The timing of this debate comes as self-appointed defenders of Indian morality have caused noisy controversy on various other issues. In every area of life, India is struggling to find a commonly acceptable line between decorous behavior and actions deemed to outrage moral sensibilities. Despite the increasingly permissive atmosphere, the occasional kiss or display of excess flesh triggers a nationwide, media-fueled storm.