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By INDIA TODAY Principal Correspondent Farah Baria.

A bunch of studs is lined up in front of a sexy young woman, who inspects their crotches with leisurely distaste before taking her pick. The camera lingers on their, uh .. assets, before moving upward to reveal that the men are holding ice candies. Nope, not a soft porn flick. It's an advertisement for Kwality Walls ice cream. Slogan: Mate Your Stick.

A nubile nymphet in trendy blue jeans is impaled on a cross. Slogan: Lee Jeans. Let the Worship Begin.

Cricketer Rahul Dravid walks into a polling booth and offers his foot for the voting mark. His hands, you see, are full of Britannia Snax. Slogan: Eat Healthy, Think Better.

When the last advertisement was aired on TV some months ago, several irate viewers complained that it was disrespectful to Indian democracy. The Kwality Walls ad predictably infuriated feminists and women's groups. And Arvind Fashions quietly withdrew the Lee jeans commercial after Christians across the country protested that it hurt their religious sentiments.
"In fact, every year the charges keep increasing," says Gaulbert Pereira, general secretary of the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI), a self-regulatory body that serves as an ethical watchdog and encourages people to register complaints. Since anonymity is guaranteed, the public does not hesitate to do so. In the past year, the ASCI received over 200 angry missives; 151 of these were admitted by the organisation's Consumer Complaints Council (CCC) and 86 were upheld as being misleading, indecent or hazardous to the general public. "Though the ASCI has no statutory power and cannot take legal action, 71 of the 86 offenders have either modified or withdrawn their ads," claims Pereira. Reason: most 'culprits' are ASCI members who probably recognise the wisdom of bowing to public sentiment.

"Today most viewers simply don't accept offensive advertising passively," says Bharat Kapadia, chairman of the 252-member ASCI, the only organisation of its kind in the country. "Though the industry initially felt the need for ethical bounds, today the viewers themselves are becoming vigilant," adds Sam Balsara, managing director of Madison Advertising. Recently, a television ad for Bajaj Auto showed three cool riders on their Classic SL scooters, playing chess on the pillion while zigzagging through
heavy Mumbai traffic. One of them jumps a road divider and all three vault over a plank, continuing their game with casual sangfroid. While the advertising world gushed over the commercial's technical finesse, some viewers pointed out that it was encouraging traffic violations. When asked for a justification, Bajaj discreetly withdrew the ad. "It cost over a crore to make the commercial but the company evidently had no choice," confirms an insider at Lintas, the creative genius behind the commercial. Similarly a spot in which a hausfrau promises to include a Vim washing bar in her daughter's dowry was modified when Sun TV received complaints that the ad implicitly endorsed the illegal practice of dowry.

Some couch cops are pretty enterprising when it comes to substantiating their objections. Recently, a complainant from Chennai sent a sample of Vim ultra dishwash powder to a chemical lab to verify if it contained extracts of pure lemon juice as the ad claimed. The results were negative and the 'drops' were subsequently 'edited' from the ad. A consumer from Mumbai decided to check out if LG Electronics' microwave oven actually has a '3-D showerwave system that preserves essential vitamins and nutrition'. Only to find that the claim was hollow. Another gentleman challenged an advertisement by Dalmia Industries Ltd which claimed that its herbal product Learnol Plus improved mental ability in 'retarded children and adults'. Dalmia's ads were misleading, he said, because as per research mental retardation is a genetic and irreversible condition. And when Ogilvy & Mather, one of the world's most prestigious advertising firms, released a commercial claiming that Tulsi mix gutkha was 'now safe' because it had iso 9002 certification, anti-tobacco campaigners were up in arms. The copy was hastily modified.

But it's not just about cantankerous consumers; today politically correct citizens are becoming vocal. Hema Parikh, a Mumbai travel agent was bewildered when her two daughters refused their weekly head massage. Until she discovered the reason: an ad for hll's Coconut hair oil showed a young girl being dubbed a 'chikni chupdi chachi' by her peers because she liked the traditional oil instead of the company's supposedly trendy product. 'But are these the kind of values we want to teach our kids,' asks Parikh. Apparently not, because she soon discovered to her satisfaction that the ad had mysteriously 'disappeared'. Another ad for hll's Clinic all clear dandruff shampoo dressed a model in what appeared to be a Pakistani cricketer's uniform, with the uncharitable slogan: Dho Dala (washed out).

Now even self-appointed moralists are sharpening their claws. In an ad for Arun ice cream, a scantily clad girl steps into a hotel elevator with a fat (oops ... make that horizontally challenged) man. Enter, a waiter with a tray of Arun ice cream. One look at her curves and he 'trades' his tray with fat man for pretty woman. Another print ad for Freshnella ice cream in the
Bombay Times claimed, "Delicious ice cream goes hand-in-hand with sex", along with some titillating visuals. While Enterprise Nexus, the agency that created the ad, evidently thinks it makes sense, parents are wondering why something as innocuous as ice cream is being consistently coupled with coital insinuations.

"I think I am reasonably liberal but when I saw the Kwality Feast
commercial with my pubescent daughter I was embarrassed," says Mumbai businessman Nitin Bhagat. He watched uneasily as a bevy of college girls 'eve-teased' a group of sheepish boys, suggestively holding up their ice cream sticks 'like edible dildos'. The commercial ended with the 'Big F' printed brazenly on screen. "Thank goodness someone had the sense to remove it," Bhagat says fervently. Not all corporates are as obliging though. When asked to pull out a 'vulgar, erotic' commercial for Durex condoms, manufacturers TTK-LIG Ltd flatly refused. A Kelvinator refrigerators ad, which takes a dig at a Carnatic music teacher, continued despite indignant protests that it smacked of ethnic prejudice. Why the refusal to budge? Clients with limitless
advertising budgets exercise considerable clout in the ad industry, confides an insider. And without legal backing the ASCI cannot bring them to heel. Despite this, hll, which has an ad budget of Rs 712 crore, has withdrawn or modified over half a dozen spots in the past year, including the Big F, Mate Your Stick and the Vim ads. "If people find them offensive, we have no
choice but to agree," says hll spokesperson Debashish Ray. Time to bring out the magnifying glass and scissors, folks.

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