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New Delhi, September 2: Sakshi Ahuja was 24 and looking for a partner. At which point the problems began. She felt ill at ease at clubs and pubs and her friends didn’t help much either. Then she came across a little mouse which changed her life. She began to date online. “I made a lot of friends and also met my would-be husband on one of the dating sites,” says the PR professional who is set to marry in a couple of months.
Sakshi is not alone. The world is flirting, dating, romancing and finding mates on the Net. Meeting singles at social gatherings, via friends or at parties is passe. Cyber dating is the hot, new way to encounter like-minded people, with thousands of people logging on and signing up with registered dating sites every day. The latest entrant among dating sites is the year-old Fropper.com, which is already claiming itself to be India’s No. 1 relationship site. “Fropper’s mission is to allow everyone to frop and eliminate loneliness from their lives,” says webmaster Vir Parekh of People’s Interactive, the agency that handles the site. A subsidiary of the American DesiCupid, Fropper (for friend hopper) serves as the online address book to look for contacts and find instant dates.
In fact, most other dating sites—Friends4u, Findmelove, One4me—aim at doing just that: providing clean fun and finding friends, as opposed to the notorious adult sites parents warn their kids against.
“Dating through these sites is safe and a great way to meet interesting people from diverse backrounds,” says 26-year-old Ashish Mehra, a software professional. “You can always accept or decline dates immediately,” he adds. A shy Arjun Sinha, 29, also finds the sites a heaven sent. “Dating online is fun and gives you options too,” says the client servicing executive.
Besides teens and singles looking for spouses, the sites are a good meeting point for bored housewives and divorced people. Says Anju Menon, a homemaker: “The sites are plain fun. Unlike adult sex sites, chatting here is safe. People don’t insist on meeting but are there when you need them,” she adds.
The icing on the cake is, of course, the features the dating sites offer. One can access a wide range of profiles with members’ photos and audio/video clips. Many sites even match profiles based on personalities. Most of these sites have been around for five or six years, with the nine-year-old CyberDating.net claiming “over 1,000 hits every day”.
So the odds of finding someone special are in your favour. On the flip side, the profile can be accessed by anybody online and the anonymity encourages cheating. But if one knows the tricks of the trade, it’s a good way to find a friend.
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