BENGALURU: In this age of speed dating, blind dating and online dating, you might want to reconsider the neighbourhood you want to live in, depending on the number of right swipes that might come your way. Tinder has made this job easier for those interested, by analysing data to narrow down on areas that get the most number of right swipes. The neighbourhoods in Bengaluru that top this list are: Koramangala, Whitefield, HSR Layout, Jayanagar, Kalyan Nagar and JP Nagar.
City Express speaks to a few users of the dating app in these localities to see how well they score in these neighbourhoods. The study suggests that Koramangala seems to have a leading score in the city. A 28-year-old graphic designer Rohan Mathew (name changed), who resides in the area, says, moving to this neighbourhood three years ago was a good decision. He has met a lot of interesting people. “It’s cool to know that we top the list of most ‘right swiped’ areas in town,” he says.
Most men, CE spoke to, aren’t happy about their experiences as they do not get swiped ‘right’ very often. They say most women go for ‘good looks’, and not personality. They also have had fears of being catfished. On the other hand, women too say they do get right swipes a lot, they get as many as 10 to 15 a week. They further add that the app doesn’t really help them find ‘true love’.Harsha, a software engineer from Whitefield says a woman swiped him right, and the first thing she asked was his profession.
“I told her I am a software engineer. She turned out to be on a job hunt and she only swiped right to those who could potentially refer her and get her interviews,” he says.
‘Can’t find something real’
Monica Sharma, an MBA student in JP Nagar, says she gets about 10 to 15 right swipes on her Tinder profile but most are not the type she’s interested in. However, she once did find an interesting match.
“I met a guy who told me he had trust issues as he had been heartbroken many times. We kind of hit it off. But one day, I was talking to my friend about him and she asked me to show his picture. When I did, she told me that he has cheated on someone very close to her. I blocked him instantly. I debated on deleting the app too but I didn’t, I’m just more careful now. For me, it’s more about killing time now than finding something real,” she says.
Sonali Shah (name changed) says she spends most time on the app unmatching and blocking men. “I get sleazy messages and pictures from guys after just saying hi, or sometimes without even saying hi. Guys look just for a hookup without even having a conversation,” says the resident of HSR Layout.
Some even got stood up by their date after interesting conversations over a phone chat. Gaurav H, a 22-year-old engineering student from JP Nagar, says his match stopped responding to his messages and calls on the day of their first date. “She later sent a text, pretending that nothing happened. I stopped replying to her,” says Gaurav who has been using the app for about four months now. Melson, 26, adds, “My experience with the app in general isn’t that good because if you aren’t good looking, you hardly get any matches. Nobody really cares about personality.”
Man on hunt to find bahu for his mother
Sheela Rao (name changed), also from Whitefield, says all she could learn about the man she went out with was his mother’s favourite colour and sari. “He kept talking only about his mother. He even told me that his mother knew everything about me because he used to show our chats to her. Then he called his mom and made both of us talk to each other. Following our first date, he started calling me his girlfriend. I didn’t know anything about him. All I knew was that his mother loves red silk sarees and that she wants him to find a bahu (daughter in-law) fast,” she shares. Srinivasa, another Tinder user, had the shock of his life when he realised the profile with the picture of a ‘pretty girl’ he swiped right to, was actually a guy. “While I was chatting, I found out that it was a ‘He’ and he told me that he was pretending to be a woman first because he wants to lure guys. He said it was ‘normal’ to do so,”
says the resident of HSR Layout.
(with inputs from Simran Handa and Sharanya Eshwar)