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Like any other average Indian TV viewer, I let myself be forced to watch these commercials between the shows and movies that interest me. Going for the remote the moment they are aired is not always a wise option because it invariably means I would get stuck with some other channel, losing track of what I was viewing in the first place, and would end up gathering a jumble of content spanning across variety of channels, finally spending more time in front of TV than I planned to spend.
The crux is that one has to bear with the commercials; they come as a part of the package deal whenever we open up any TV channel. Any interruption in entertainment is offensive enough, but commercials are more than that. And some commercials are more annoying than the others. There is a peculiar genre of commercials which I as a typical Indian have never been very comfortable with, but they have been there with my favourite shows just like spyware with cracked full versions, riding the sidecar and singing aloud "Yeh Dosti, Hum nahin todenge..." .
Not long back, we had contraceptive ads that got the seniors in the house slightly perplexed during their telecast. To start with, these ads were thankfully limited to an image being displayed with commentary in the background. In the improvised, later versions there would be an experienced and slightly senior young woman advising another one over the importance, ease of use and convenience of using a particular contraceptive, backed up more effectively by a prim and propah Lady Doc who said something that the kids (forget the adults, they would be busy trying hard to figure out where to look, all the time fearing that the kids would either turn around to ask what the thing was, or vociferously make a demand for the object in the ad) already remembered by heart. Then the ad makers discovered the power of music and decided to lure the junta into buying their products through it. As a result, we heard toddlers and kids singing along “… Nirodh! Nirodh!” in decibel levels higher than those of the blaring TV sets, every time these commercials were aired. There also used to be some other “Sarkari” ads on family planning, number of offspring and distance between them, right age of marriage, ‘ORS’- the magic potion etc. etc., but like most other sarkari things they hardly deserve a mention. Nobody ever gave them any serious thought, not even the audience they were actually targeted at.
The transition started subtly, with the ‘AXE Deo’ commercials where we would have the hero using a generous dose of the spray to entice the lady or ladies around and walk away with them, either just like that or playing Pied Piper of Hamelin. The Ad Moghuls were keeping a keen eye on the audience’ reaction. They could see no raised eyebrows and kept on developing their courage and confidence constantly over time.
So what do we have today?
- Set Wet Zatak Deo ads, with a young, fashionable lady losing control of her car over the magical smell and bumping into another one; another young lady dumping her would be fiancé, ring and all, for a passerby wearing the deo, or a young teacher losing control of the class and self and entering into fantasies over a new smell that enters the classroom with a latecomer. So much for the olfactory delights.
- A housemaid discovering a pack of ‘MOODS’ under the pillow and starting to radiate sufficient heat that would make the tube melt, while the pair who presumably occupied the bed earlier is biking around, with the young lady sending strong signals to her mate by chewing up his earlobes from the pillion seat, and the famous song “Yeh kya hua….!” being used as a jingle. Kishore Da would be far from happy in heaven over such gross misuse of his great rendition.
- The setup looking that of some pooja in the household, and Stardust discovery Indrani Banerjee draped up in traditional Bengali Sari, brushing up accidentally against a young, handsome guest in the house (wearing 'Wild Stone' deo, what for? for driving women around wild, of course) ending up fantasizing about youknowwhat.
- School Kids (GASP!) using a deo (they sure know so many things these days) to snatch another classmate’s girlfriend (PHEW!)। SET WET ZATAK captures schools too!!
- A young man with a body covered with kiss marks, complaining to the Policemen and showing them the love-bites (and maybe more) that he received from a Gang of Girls as a result of using the SET WET ZATAK deo. The Policemen are more interested in trying the deo than in helping the victim.
- Lady Security Officers at an airport terminal disrobing a young man on the pretense of checking up, actually to get a feel of his underclothes.
- Saeed Zulfi getting molested back-stage by female models in the Men’s Green Room for wearing a particular brand of underwear, ending up on the bed in barely that piece of clothing (if you can call it that), with lipstick smears all over and enjoying the experience.
- Four Indian young ladies, going out picnicing to some obscure beach in their new Tata Indica V2 Xeta, making propositions (for some kind of fun, if I am not all that dumb) to a sun-tanned hunk en route who is dumberer than Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels combined, and him responding with "May be you should try the Beach Cafe!". Hard for me to digest it was an ad for a TATA product.
The first time I saw this one, I thought - GOD!! Did I really see that? And then my mind wandered on so many lands, from the degeneration of Indian society, to the ‘blame it on the TV syndrome’, to the women’s lib, to the “Join the Mallikas', Rakhis', Meghnas' and the Shefalis' Bandwagon’ messages to teen young ladies of India, to the ‘New Indian Woman has arrived!’ messages, to…………! I guess the VIP Frenchie or Tuffs shoes ads of the yesteryears that created a furore in their times were much more decent as compared to the content I have been constantly seeing off late. Gone are the days when a senior lady, impressed with a particular brand of vest, would just say..."Achchha! Roan nahin uthata? Tab toh SWAGAT Baniyan hi leni chahiye!". Today, in contrast, we have people arguing about "Apun ke Aaraam ya Style ka maamla", refusing to "Adjust" or walking around wearing their LUCK (and conveniently forgetting to wear anything above it).
I have formed an opinion that Indian Ad designers are getting bolder by the day, bolder enough to be called crude. True, the Indian Society has been coming of age lately (read 'following the so-called openness blindly'). The thinking, convictions and standards are changing fast. We have developed a callous, "Chalta Hai" attitude and have become too accommodating over time. The limit is that we have started accepting anything disguised as a commercial, allowing it to be aired in our homes, oblivious of the fact that all the generations in the household see and hear this stuff. Or, does that mean the Ad Agencies are taking limitless liberties with our senses and subconscious and are constantly pushing us, driving us towards the wall?
Young Political Platoons (Moral Police of India, I mean)!!! Are you folks done up with Valentine's Day closures, making tableaus and taking out processions of pairs hunted down from parks and other public places, burning posters of 'B' and 'C' grade sex-capers, protesting against misrepresentation of Hindu Gods and Goddesses, hanging effigies of anyone who dares to hurt your religious or cultural sentiments (???... Hey! We forgot you people were human after all..) and Shilpa-Gere matters over envy? Take a closer look; the Indian TV has a lot of masala to keep you folks busy and in news for a long time.
And by the way, Indian Censor Board Members, are you reading this by any chance?
16 comments:
parul (psoni@ualr.edu) says:
Your blog speaks the truth. After reading your blog it makes me question myself "Is it really westernization? Can we blame another country's culture?” I don't think so. The west never imposed its culture on other countries. Problem is with Indian mentality, people are ashamed of their own culture and are very open to adopt western culture without even considering consequences of it. After living 4 years in US and watching TV average of 4 hrs a week, I must admit that I had never seen any obscene or a pervert sort of adv on US channels. Initially, I use to find all American advs very dumb they only showed what's in their product or tell what is side effect present/absent in the same product from a different brand. I use to think they lack creativity and I would think of Surf Excel (bhai-behan) adv. or the Jalebi wala adv. of some cooking oil or mummy mummy bhookh lagi maggi adv.. These were really cool advs they got attention they deserved, entertained both kids and adults, caused no harm even if children repeated the jingle and probably it increased the sales. Indian adv industry has matured only enough to introduce " Pied Piper of Hamelin act"; But has failed to think beyond promoting a product or increasing its sales. It has failed to consider negative impact of such advs on our innocent new generation. In contrast to this, American adv industry has either learnt hidden impact of such advs on junta or the adv creators / censor board was able to see the long term effects of such advs. In either case, there is a simple lesson to be learnt: Adv should be used to make people aware of the product and its benefits over other products.
Vivek Das (krazymarketer@gmail.com) says:
The 'as-it-appears' degradation of certain sections of the advertising industry has got more to do with the mindset and approach of the new generation. The ads that you have referred to essentially lack the primary objective - the brand messaging, the communication. The conceptualizers I think were just plagued with the objective of creating buzz... which they successfully did, but the brand's message was lost! The way the whole process of agency-brand association works is very complicated. Sometimes there are several agencies involved... and you know what they say about too many chefs. This practically happens, and I see it very regularly. The Indian advertising space hardly understands the idea of a viral ad, forget about making a scalable viral ad. It is in very nascent stages, and far away from appropriate. To talk about misuse of freedom of speech would be trivial... it is obvious. I dont suppose the idea of having a censor board for advertising will be supported by too many in the game. In fact, the brands themselves need to revisit their campaigns to see what went wrong, and take corrective measures for future campaigns. There are however a lot of other agencies doing good work, and we can just hope that the industry matures faster!
neelabh (neelabhparmar29@yahoo.co.in) says:
To begin with its one among the best efforts to raise the curtains from a naked truth that often went unnoticed. That was really appreciable sir. Being an engineering graduate i never understand what the hell is this marketing strategy behind adds like AMUL MACHO. But being a civilized citizen from an intelluctual society of india i m forced to question my intelligence. Same thing as said by saurabh once in the crowd evn i used to laugh at those adds but here back home i dont know how to react when my cousins who are small kids of 5-10 yrs sing the jingle "ye to bada...............hai"when the add is aired. One simple question that arises in my mind is that every such product that is nowhere related to a women is being advertised by women with again the same bottom line as in adds of zatak or amul macho or tata indica etc etc..........(theres a long list for that). Is women too a commodity that along with promotion adds to the value of the product???????? what kind of bussiness aspect is that???????? ... I still think adds can be created in a very healthy and clean way that could evn catch up the audience. Well i hope thats the cause why adds r created "to catch up the audience" and to do such one doesnt require to be obscene in nature. To add to my point i remember many of those commercials that we loved to watch. Being a channel hopper my channel hopping always came to a pause at those adds. Remember the commercials of coca-cola with amir as tapori, hyderabadi, bihari , jatt, nepali and many others. Remember those commercials of sbi loans with people having bet for "changing names like chimanlal charlie" and "walking without trousers to office". The list is simply long enough to suggest that most of the adds loved by everyone were not obscene in nature. Regardng the airing of present day adds & role of Moral police would bring another debatable issue on light "censorship on small screen".
Rahul Singh (rahulscontact@yahoo.com) says:
Bottom line is ‘IT WORKS’….if not consciously, then subconsciously almost every one wants to be “the man” or “the woman” whom every one desires’ this is what these ads aim at and they very much succeed. We can argue here as much as we want ..the truth public buys their products after seeing these ads otherwise these ads would have been history. No matter what any one writes , the companies are laughing all the way to bank.. PS- Sales of MOODS increased after that advertisement
Swapnil (sips16@gmail.com) says:
two mutually exclusive comments: 1. blog content: gr8 job. very nicely and creatively portrayed the issue and kept the reader interested throughout keeping the language simple and yet effective. 1. blog context/issue: i have not really seen these adds so can't understand the gravity of the issue. however, can say for sure that there will be no use trying to curb such progressions towards westernization of our culture ..and adds are merely a small part of it. Its all in individuals perspective and in today's business driven market, whatever sells is served. Looks like my india trip is going to be a culture (minor) shock !
Sumit Kudesia (sumit_imt2005@yahoo.com) says:
Aptly expressed,the issue has been lingering in my subconsious mind for a long time,reading the article has made me ponder upon it consiously.Come to think of it the primary objective of a commercial is noticeability of the product and the brand the target audience which would further be used by the entrepreneurs to attain long term objectives like brand building and short term objectives like product trial.With the economy open to foreign players the competition for the shelf space has become more fierce than ever,the exposure of satellite channels to every nook and corner of the country,influx of foreign values amidst the inherent problems in the country,the easiest technique being used by the marketers is to expolit the weakest and the most intense desire in an average human being for noticeability.The products highlighted by the writer in the commercials are used by a large population. Products which have reached the smallest towns and villages of the country and the market is too truly too tempting to resist.So the marketer resorts to what is the simplest techique to lure the customer sometimes at the pretext of humour amidst the most outrageous ideas as illustrated in the article.What the marketers forget is the complexity of the human psyche.What is taken for granted is the fact that noticeability is never enough.What follows noticeability is a rational analytical process which is the backbone of every buying process.And marketing in India is even more challenging.The essense is that beneath the strongest temptations lie the forces of reasoning and analysis and that makes successful marketing a very tough process.It is high time the marketers gather a more thorough analysis of the consumer psyche instead of easy but unsuccessful ways of improving their product's noticeabilty.A better understanding of Indian sensitivities and values is also required to avoid negative noticability of their products.
saurabh seth (seth.saurabh84@gmail.com) says:
that is a great comment on how the ads have come to age i never really paid attention to all of this as it was pretty natural for five guys living in and disscussing and even having a laugh at them,perhaps away from family and sort of out of senses but ever since i have come home the effect is quite obvious as i see it daily with my three year old nephew who has "AMUL MACHO" as his favourite ad without even understanding it and even gets really ardent on a few things leaving everyone happless to answer and finding corners to save themselves i guess the indian ad honchos have been deriving ideas from a program called "banned in america" that airs commercials that were forced off air in a liberal society like US the reason why AXN was forced out of air in india. It is a sorry situation but i believe everyone has learned to live with all of this or atleast they pretend to be everyone talks about things in their drawing rooms but no one takes them open esp. in a city like bangalore there is no public life and no action ...
Manu (manulahoti@gmail.com) says:
An ambitious yet debateable first post! Kudos :-) The question is – why should sex be a taboo in Indian society? Why should ads be banned just because they can’t be watched with the family! Even news channels (with their graphical details) or, for that matter, saas-bahu soaps ain’t U grade either! I think people and society get what they deserve, be it advertisements, television, roads or politicos. So no point blaming the adman! And yes I absolutely love the Moods advt, fantastic music ;) Afterall, everything's relative!!
vivek (vivektiwari.iitm@gmail.com) says:
yah, very true, i too was observing the same. heard of amul macho ad, but never came across(as i am not at all in to cricket!! ;o) ) well, but why only the ads, alot more than just TV/entertainment-bussiness is changing!! these are mere the reflections of a real real big change. its happening all over india, and very fast! yah somehow i feel like entertainment industry is acting as catalyst, but the real initiator of the process are not those guys! when i say catalyst, it really means a very fast catalyst!!! after thinking over it some time long back, i realized that.. its just a process, things evolve over time, some good changes.. some ugly, but it HAS to occur!! nothing much can be done towards it.. yah! developing economy, IT boom, access to info surerhighwaywhen and all, giving enough freedom to the mass population to chose their priorities and make changes according to their likes! when TV channel bussiness started long back, a regulatory structure at the beginning could have slowed down the process very well, even to the point that we would not have even be worried about these things now by this time!!! but finally, the stuffs meant to change, have to change, slower or faster. thinking of good old doordarshan, it gives me some good ideas to implement. let them rest in peace but! regards vivek
Taresh (tareshb@gmail.com) says:
Wonderful observation, lucid explanation and finally the perfect execution. How many of us would have given the thought to iniquitous role of glamorous Ads?? The article puts forward a simple yet demanding question to be answered. Whoz gonna take the first step?? Are we really awake to avoid business at the cost of our moral values??
Hansraj (hansraj4u@rediffmail.com) says:
Very good observation....which may be jiggling inside evrybdy's mind...but u hve done gr8 job to put common man's thought so nicely... U hve raised a silent question.....n frankly speeking I dont hve answer...may be few people like u, myself n some others..dont accept dez rubbish things as we still believe in our moral values n commitment to society...but when society comes there r suddenly lot of so called "Samaj ke Thekedar" get up to create nuisance... After all its democracy....n dez kinda adds r making profitable bussiness....I mean we cant blame add makers or TV channels who air such adds alone......they r doni their bussiness...they r just selling sex,bcoz loop hole in our society is accepting diz crap... I really dont know the solution but on top of this I hvent reached to the root of problem as yet.....but certainly seince fwe decades we hve came across loop holes in our society...moral n cultural values....n we hve to land up on some solution ASAP.......After we known by our values n culture across da world...not by call centre n MNC culture......... Once again ....HAPPY WRITING.....
vaibhav (vaibhav@zapak.com) says:
Sir, I truly appreciate this work of yours, but what we are getting into in an age old battle which is divided by a very thin line. The difference between good and bad, moral and immoral, creativity and nudity etc etc...is so subjective in todays world that probably getting a piece of work which appeals to ALL is just next to impossible, and then you add the business perspective (time to market, creativity, brand recall blah blah blah) to it and the complexity just increases. Where I am coming from is more a business case rather than any thing else and please mind I am not trying to defend the "amul macho" ad by any chance. But following the genre in this specific case where the product which you are selling is generic, you need to build in some sort of recall.... and hasnt it created that?? The battle then extends to the whole issue of morality as to whether you knowingly do such a stuff but then again think of it,, and I really mean a deep thought... its easy to criticise such a stuff but at the end all things point to that old phenomenon.... "badnaam hue to kya hua..... akhir naam to hua" and you will apprecaite that the coke ad, with amir khan in the train and amul macho ad were the worst 2 ads of this year...so if getting into the top slot is not possible,, get to the bottom slot..its business at the end of it.
Farhan (md.farhan@gmail.com) says:
Sir... Hats off to u... Amazing writing skills... I've bookmarked andaazebayaanaur :) Now I am more desperate to read ur next blog than the Deathly Hallows. And 'The Last Sniper' as well, if that's releasing soon :)
manpreet (manpreet.singh.bhuie@gmail.com) says:
Nice article. It really made me re-think about ads. Good going.
Sanjeet Tripathi (ved.sanju@gmail.com) says:
badhai, aakhirkaar aap bhi blogs me kood pade! shubhakaamanayein!!
An extremely good way to expose the sad demise of aesthetic sense ,decency and culture.Change is always good but openness and boldness should not wear the garb of vulgarity and raunchiness. Where are the Creative Heads? What is Brand Value?? Why has the new genre of advertisers become so handicapped that it has to use sex as a tool.Sleaze overtakes morality and the entire beauty of Indian culture ornamented with shyness dwindles in thin air.
Must say its a real eye opener and a reminder of where we are heading...
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