Recent Controversial Advertisements

They say that an advertisement agency's job is a thankless one. Ad agencies are expected to deliver that killer ad every time, thereby resulting in a huge pile of additional cash for the advertiser. If it succeeds, the advertiser is the one basking in the glory. When it fails, it's head is the first one on the chopping block.
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It should not come as a surprise then that the agencies would try to hardsell the advertisers' offering(s) through whatever means, law permitting. Consequently, the mantra for the ad agency is to "sell, sell and sell". And if "everything else fails, then start chanting sex, sex and sex; because sex always sells".
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In the recent past, we have seen ad agencies falling back on this adage rather liberally and the resultant ad contents have sometimes bordered on the outrageous. As a consequence, both the agency and the advertiser have managed to more than ruffle a few feathers.
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In the end, even our parliamentarians took notice of the resultant commotion and there was a raging debate in the parliament on the ways of stopping such ads from appearing in the media and polluting the minds of the innocent general people of the country.
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Actually it amazes me that the politicians view themselves as self-styled guardians of the very people, who are otherwise matured enough to cast their votes and decide that the same set of politicians would be running the country for the next five years. At that time, the people are capable enough to judge what's good or bad for them. But, when it comes to the depiction of anything related to the most basic urge in the media, these same people are considered to be incapable of taking the right decision. Hence, the parliamentarians have to act as chaperone!
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While I do not support the creation of yet another regulator or the idea of censorship, even then I have to accept that some of the advertisements were really in bad taste. Let's take a look at the controversial advertisements that left a bad taste in the mouth.
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1. Clean & Dry "Intimate Wash": The advertisement for a new skin whitening product for private parts, Clean & Dry Intimate Wash, was the latest in a series of controversial ads, which created a public outrage. The campaign earned the wrath of different women's groups, who called this "an ultimate insult to women”.
The commercial promises that the product, with its special pH-balanced formula, cleans and protects the private area, and even makes the skin fairer.
To me, the very idea of the ad is sickening and the execution, appalling. When I first saw the ad, the questions that came across my mind were, "What the hell! Where are we going? What's next?" The fascination of the Indians about the fairer complex is well known. This has also resulted in a very real life discrimination against women of darker complex. Knowing all these, if a company introduces and promotes - during prime time - a product like Clean & Dry Intimate Wash, then the business ethics of the company should be questioned. Perhaps the company and its management are unaware of the term, "corporate social responsibility".

Flying Machine's campaign raised "some" dust.

2. Flying Machine: Flying Machine had hoped that its newest print ad campaign would help engrave the brand into the minds of India's youth. Instead, it has flown into a storm of controversy. One of the earliest home-grown jeans brands, Flying Machine, had released a series of print advertisement where the camera zoomed on the buttock of a female model wearing tight fit jeans. The tagline in big, bold font screamed, "What an Ass!" It was probably meant to inject or highlight the oomph factor and the cool quotient in an old brand, perhaps even mimic the edginess of the "All asses were not created equal" tagline from the advertisement, released last year, by larger rival Levi Strauss & Co. While the jury is still to be out on whether Flying Machine's latest campaign has been able to achieve the avowed objectives, the advertisement, most definitely, has been able to generate heat in some quarters, especially the women rights groups.
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3. Amul Macho - Yeh to bada toing hain!: Frankly speaking, I never saw anything wrong with this ad. There were three different versions of this ad and were shown mostly during the evening prime time hours. I thought that the ads, although suggestive in parts, were pretty hilarious, as well as good and could capture the essence of the product's tagline, "Crafted for Fantasy". Well, the persons, who actually matter in these cases, evidently thought otherwise. The ad was banned from the prime time hours due to its vulgarity and suggestive sexual acts. Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI), the self-regulatory body of the advertising industry, later cleared it for public viewing. Judge for yourself.
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4. Fast Track: Fast Track, the cool brand of watches & shades from the house of Titan, introduced a TV commercial titled, "Why the world moved to autopilot?" The ad starred cricketer Virat Kohli and the chirpy Genelia D'souza. The content of the ad, created by Lowe, raised quite a storm as the ad showed the pilot getting cozy with the air hostesses. Predictably, neither the pilots nor the air hostesses were amused and asked for the withdrawal of the ad. I guess the ad agency guys were really over the top here. Worse, they stereotyped two professions and the professionals as of amorous nature. Check out the ad below.
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5. Tata DoCoMo: The last one in my list is the awful Tata DoCoMo ad. In another case of stereotyping people associated with a particular profession, the Tata DoCoMo ad shows a maid stealing a mobile phone and her employer catching her in the act when the phones starts ringing. The tagline, “No Getting Away”, suggests that wherever you may go, you'll have access to the Tata DoCoMo network. 

However, the depiction of the maid in this ad created a lot of controversies. There were several complaints that the advertisement was extremely crass and in bad taste, apart from casting aspersions on the integrity of the domestic workers as a whole. Activists argued that the domestic workers were a "super exploited lot", without any customary – let alone legal – rights worth the name. They also contended that the ad further reinforced the common prejudices against the domestic workers through stereotyping them as thieves.

The ad was, indeed, in a bad taste and the concerns raised were also very real. As a result, the company had to apologize and withdraw the ad.
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In spite of all these, be rest assured that we shall be able to create another list of awful ads around this time next year too. In the mad rush for selling one's products or services to the most number of customers, both the ad agency and the advertiser sometimes allow ethics to take a back seat and the resultant output deeply offends the sensibility of the prospective consumers. In the end, the advertiser, instead of gaining new clients, manages to even lose a part of the existing base. Yet, neither the agency, nor the company, has learnt the lesson. That's the amusing part.