New Delhi: The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting has written to the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) to ensure that "overtly sexual" deodorant adverts are modified or taken off air within five days.
Taking serious note of racy ads that portray women "as lustily hankering after men under influence of such deodorants," the ministry has said these adverts offend "good taste and decency" and appear "indecent, vulgar and suggestive".
"The ads brim with messages aimed at tickling libidinous male instincts," the information ministry said in a statement.
The brands under scanner are Wild Stone, Addiction Deo, New Axe Googly, Zatak Axe, Set Wet, Denver Deo and Axe, according to media reports.
The ministry has also objected to the "punch lines" used with the deodorant brand names. The ministry said the ads appear to be "grossly" violating the advertising code in Rule 7 of the Cable Television Networks Rules, 1994.
"It is, therefore, requested that ASCI may consider the matter and take up the matter urgently with advertisers to either modify the ads or take them off air," the ministry said in a letter to the council's Secretary General Allan Collaco.
The ASCI is a self-regulatory body of the advertising industry. The ASCI acknowledged in a statement on its website that "complaints for deodorant ads have been high in the last two years."
The ministry also said the adverts violate India's advertising code, which states that "cable operators should ensure that the portrayal of the female form... is tasteful and aesthetic and within the well established norms of good taste and decency".
The Axe ad has been held up before for portraying an Axe user who turns into a chocolate man that women take a bite of.
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