Reliance, Idea, Dabur pulled up over misleading ads

The Advertising Standards Council of India last week pulled up 15 major consumer goods and service companies for running misleading or otherwise improper ad campaigns between July and October this year.

The companies that include Reliance Communications, Idea Cellular, fast moving consumer goods maker Dabur, Elder Pharma, and coaching centre Career Launcher, have been asked to modify their ads after investigation by the ASCI's consumer complaints council.

Reliance Communications was quick to act, suspending a television commercial, which failed to substantiate its claim that it is the ''fastest mobile broadband service in India,'' as it gave no comparative data of other mobile services. The company said it was making modifications in the commercial.

Another mobile operator, Idea Cellular, also had to modify its commercial, which showed people walking while talking on mobile phones. The ASCI upheld complaints from consumers that it encouraged "the unsafe act of walking while talking on the mobile phone."

"Some action sequences as depicted in the TV channels, show dangerous practices and manifest a disregard for safety without justifiable reason," ASCI said.

Dabur had to modify two of its TV commercials that ASCI had found to be misleading. One was for Dabur Vatika shampoo, which claimed that the product ''eliminates dandruff from first wash''. The other was for Dabur Lal Oil, which claimed that massaging the scalp with the oil ''leads to doubly faster growth in babies''. The ASCI found the claims to be misleading.

Career Launcher's campaign claiming that ''four out of five IIM call-getters in CAT'08 from Delhi and NCR'' were its students has been suspended, as again it was unsubstantiated.

In the case of Elder Pharma, however, it is India's strict Mother Grundy that has come to the fore. ASCI found Elder's campaign showing a woman unbuttoning her shirt in an advertisement for the deodorant 'Fuel' to be vulgar, and said it must be modified. One would have thought that a woman undoing a few shirt buttons is not entirely inappropriate in a deodorant ad, but ASCI clearly thinks otherwise.