Among the many myths about Indian cinema, one of the most prevalent is that kissing is banned. However, early films such as Zarina (dir. Ezra Mir, 1932), which caused such controversy it was removed from the circuits, featured 86 kisses. There is no legal prohibition on kissing in Indian cinema but it largely vanished from the 1940s until it reappeared in several films in the 1990s, perhaps the most famous being Aamir Khan and Karisma's long smooch in Raja Hindustani (dir.Dharmesh Darshan 1996). So what happened to the onscreen kiss in those five decades?

While the kiss - the lip-to-lip erotic kind - was absent from Hindi cinema during these years it was implied as two flowers touched, or when the camera shows a couple reflected in a pool which suddenly ripples as they move closer to each other or the camera simply moved away as they drew near. There were also many songs about kissing, one of my personal favourites being Salman Khan, clad in a vest, emerging from a river in full sight of a troupe of dances, the males pulling their trousers down in one dance step while our hero sings (in English), 'One two three, give me a kiss' to Manisha Koirala.

Kissing is present in the Kamasutra so it cannot be dismissed as something westernized, but rather it is seen in India as something to be done in private rather than in public. The boundary between the private and the public in film is shifting and porous, as is the behaviour of stars, many of whom refuse to kiss (Shah Rukh, until Jab Tak Hai Jaan, dir.Yash Chopra, 2012), while others, such as Emraan Hashmi, are famous for their kissing. Filmmakers are also wary of the censors, perhaps fearing the kiss will be cut, and even passionate bedroom scenes often avoid kissing - at least lip to lip.

Yet it was during the kiss-free years that Hindi cinema evolved its own ways of showing romance, love and eroticism. Landscapes and other locations, costumes (including the 'wet sari') and symbols set the scene - a log cabin indicating privacy and intimacy between the couple, from which the male star would leap to yell 'Yahoo!' Dialogues, which were oft-quoted outside the movie hall, developed a language of love blending Hindi, Urdu, Hinglish, Punjabi and English, although preferring the declaration of love to be in English: 'I love you.' The film song supplemented its lyrics with dance steps which could be romantic, erotic or suggestive, and possibly obscene.

This focus on language in Hindi cinema, whether in its dialogues or lyrics, is perhaps the key to the kiss or, rather the missing kiss. You can't kiss and talk; and you certainly can't kiss and sing. Perhaps it is more romantic or erotic to say, 'I love you' than it is to kiss. The rise of onscreen kissing in recent years may be more to do with shifting domains of the private and the public. Hindi cinema is perhaps not so much breaking taboos but rather creating an intimate space for the onscreen couple, which is emulated in real life. This may be helped by changing viewing practices as audiences watch films in less socially differentiated movie halls, the multiplexes being mixed venues with no hierarchy of seating. While some films remain popular viewing for the whole family, others are watched by groups of young people, or by couples, and are increasingly viewed on small screens which create a more private setting.

Kissing also focuses the audience's attention on the couple more than the family unit. Older films often had the couple coming together before the interval then having to find a place in the family in the second half. Perhaps films now are less concerned with the couple and the family and more with ideas of modern love and romance as a means of self-fulfilment and consumerism. Yet Hindi cinema continues to show both of these views as part of its important negotiation between the modern and the traditional.

Kissing in older Hollywood films was a representation of the erotic and suggested much more. Now that films show intimate scenes, the kiss is no longer so important and this may be the case also for Hindi cinema. The most erotic moment in Hindi cinema is often said to be the encounter between Prince Salim (Dilip Kumar) and Anarkali (Madhubala) in Mughal-eAzam (dir. K. Asif, 1960) when he brushes her face with a feather. The truly erotic may be that which is not seen but which is suggested and then shaped in the audience's imagination. Dialogues of romance can be repeated and songs can be sung in other contexts. But a kiss is only ever a kiss.

Dwyer is professor of Indian Cultures & Cinema at SOAS, University of London