Advertising Standard Council of India is the ultimate regulatory body for all the brands and their respective ad campaigns that they run. This time Advertising Standard Council of India has pulled up big Indian brands like Hindustan Unilever, Patanjali, Pepsico, Pizza Hut, Britannia, Amazon, Voltas, LG Electronics, Flipkart, Axis Bank and Air Asia under its red light area. As all these brand names have apparently been running misleading ad campaigns and such steps are not acceptable as per ASCI guidelines.
It happened so when the Customer Complaints Council of Advertising Standards Council of India received around 155 consumer complaints. Out of these 155 complaints, the council has already held enquiry cases for 109 of them.
10 enquiry cases were against Baba Ramdev for his brand’s Patanjali’s products like Kacchi Ghani mustard oil, Jeera Biscuit, Dant Kanti, Kesh Kanti and others. Before this 6 different complaints were filed against Patanjali only in the months of April and March this year. Till now, Yoj Baba Ramdev’s brand has not been able to substantiate its claim against the complaints registered for its products. For instance, Dant Kanti, Divya Swasari Pravahi and Kesh Kanti have especially been tagged by both the customers and Customer Complaints Council as “as misleading by exaggeration”. On hearing this verdict, Patanjali did come ahead with retaliated reactions suggesting some opponent MNC to be responsible for such allegations. Also one company spokesperson said, “They cannot pass any judgment against the non-members. There are several judgments against them (ASCI). Its order is not binding on any non-member. Moreover, they do not have any expert on ayurveda and life sciences and are deciding the matter. They do not have any fact finding procedure or a laboratory and decide the case in a meeting only. We will explore legal assistance in this matter.”
While brands like Pepsi and HUL have not responded to this case raised against them by ASCI.
Out of these two above mentioned brands, PepsiCo. is the one, the campaign of which said ‘Har Bottle par Paytm Cash pakka’ has been caught as a misleading gesture just to make customers buy as many Pepsi bottles to get a minimum cash. Now what type of cash? The company has n0t mentioned this condition it its ad therefore ASCI has pulled up PepsiCo. “The advertisement itself does not clarify the main condition for the offer of it being mobile number specific. Also, the disclaimers in the advertisement were not in the same language as that of the voice over.”
Then comes the case against Britannia Industries for their claim of “100 per cent whole wheat bread” as one being majorly “misleading by ambiguity as the whole wheat content in the product (Whole Wheat Bread) is in the range of 50 per cent to 65 per cent and other solid content in the product is coming from other sources.”
Pizza Hut has been taken under consideration for its misleading advertisement which says “Any Pizza Any Size @ 199 each when you buy 2 Pizzas” because nothing of this sort is happening in reality.
Voltas of the Tata Group in its ad claimed to run “two air-conditioners at the cost of one” has been found faulty and “misleading by omission of disclaimers giving reference to the comparison being made between a Voltas All Star Inverter AC and a conventional start-stop AC”. Likewise, LG Electronics claimed that “The AC That Saves Every Day, LG – No.1 Air Conditioner” and “Mosquito Away” have still not been not been “substantiated and are misleading.”
Campaign run by Axis Bank which said “Complete business banking solutions” was established as misleading because there are some limitations on the features which the bank actually offers.
Air Asia which is a private carrier claimed an “Air Fare from Chennai to Australia available for Rs 4,999” but later on with customer’s complaints, this was found as “false and misleading”.
Lastly, Hindustan Unilever’s Sunsilk and its ad which said “3 months mein lambe baal” has also proved to be a false statement.
So all in all, the aforementioned brands have now been targeted by ASCI for misleading their customers in order to obtain sales. We will have to wait for the ASCI’s final verdict against such false claims which have affected the common public to some extent. Some of these brands will definitely counter the claims, but all we hope for is that this ongoing on misleading advertisements to end one day.
