Her 60-year-old husband brought a woman half his age home and started an illicit relationship. But Saroj Kansal (name changed) had seen it coming.

Now the 55-year-old social worker specialising in counselling sessions to save marriages shudders at the sight of her own matrimonial life in tatters.

Her husband, says Saroj, is addicted to online pornography and this in-fixed in him insatiable lust. "The woman is now coercing my husband to secure a divorce from me and to discard me and my family from his life," she told Mail Today.

Experts say men who habitually use pornography sometimes withdraw from intimacy and occasionally make demands on female partners for sexual acts that are uncomfortable, painful or degrading to the woman.

The couple has a son and daughter aged 30 and 23 respectively. Saroj was working as a chemical engineer and says her husband asked her to quit the job after their wedding in 1984. She knocked on the Supreme Court's doors last week through lawyer Kamlesh Vaswani, seeking to become party to a public interest litigation already filed by the advocate in 2013 in which the court is issuing periodic directions towards completely blocking online pornography.

Saroj says if her husband suffered from the addiction despite being a well-educated person and in an advanced age, pornography sites would have far more harmful impact on the youth.

BLOCK ON PORN SITES, SHE DEMANDS

"I appeal for complete blocking of porn sites. I approached the Supreme Court as I feel nobody else should suffer like me. I am unfortunately a victim of matrimonial problems resulting out of porn addiction of my husband," she says.

Millions of Indians access pornography on their smartphones or by inserting memory chips containing racy videos that are easily available at low prices, say reports. Some Internet companies say it is impossible to block all such sites as many of the servers that host them are outside India.

Also, the sites can be accessed through proxy servers. "Families in India are being ruined because of the porn addiction by some or the other member. Porn addiction leaves a deep impact on children, youth, and adults in particular who in turn become perverted and indulge in wrongful and anti- social activities punishable under the laws of this country," says Saroj.

On Wednesday, she filed a fresh affidavit based on her interaction with several women who suffered like her.

"I and my children are suffering as a result of the porn addiction of my husband. Being a social worker I respectfully submit that there is easy accessibility of porn websites which are abundant in number. Easy access of violent and hardcore porn websites is causing immense damage to family values in India. People of all ages are becoming perverted and morally bankrupt due to porn addiction," she argues.

IS BAN THE WAY OUT?

The case comes against the backdrop of the Centre blocking hundreds of adult websites in 2015 to prevent porn becoming a "social nuisance", sparking a debate about censorship and freedom in the world's largest democracy. The ban was partially lifted days later following a wave of criticism. Saroj says easy accessibility of porn now-a-days in India is a major cause of increasing sex crimes against women and minor girls. Delhi-NCR is now notorious as the "rape capital".

Many porn videos show children and women in poor light, objectifying and disgracing them, she maintains. The apex court earlier asked the Centre to find out "ways and means" to block "blue films" on the Internet, saying obscenity, which is a crime under the Indian law, "cannot be allowed to be perpetuated".

While some analysts treat porn as a harmless habit, near-universal among men, a second perspective sees it as a kind of gateway drug-a vice that paves the way for more-serious betrayals. The court is also exploring the possibility of banning watching of pornographic material in any form at public places and has also sought the view of the Centre on if it can be made a crime.

Despite stiff objection from the central government, which said it only favoured banning child pornography sites and not 'going beyond', considering a citizen's right to privacy, and also because it did not want to be 'moral policing', the court directed it to 'develop a mechanism' for blocking all porn sites with the help of IT experts and service providers.

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