ASCI clamps down on fairness and skin lightening advertising

A long overdue decision by the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) will be welcomed by consumers and activists alike.

This ad of L'Oreal's, featuring Diane Keaton, was in the news for being heavily photoshopped (courtesy: L'Oreal)[/caption]

ASCI has issued "Guidelines of Advertising for Skin Lightening or Fairness Improvement Products" in a bid to protect the consumer from questionable and irresponsible notions on the advantages of being fair that are communicated in advertising.

As importantly, the guidelines ban the use of post production to mislead the consumer on the efficiency of fairness and skin lightening products.

In the preamble to the guidliness, ASCI argues, "While all Fairness products are licensed for manufacture and sale by relevant state Food & Drug Administrations (FDA) under the Drugs & Cosmetics Act, there is a strong concern in certain sections of society that advertising of fairness products tends to communicate and perpetuate the notion that dark skin is inferior and undesirable. ASCI code's Chapter III 1 b already states that advertisements should not deride race, caste, color, creed or nationality.

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Yet given how widespread the advertising for fairness and skin lightening products is and the concerns of different stakeholders in society, ASCI therefore felt a need to frame specific guidelines for this product category."

The broad guidelines are as under:

1. Advertising should not communicate any discrimination as a result of skin colour.

2. Advertising should not use post production visual effects on the model/s to show exaggerated product efficacy.

3. Advertising should not associate darker or lighter colour skin with any particular socio-economic strata, caste, community, religion, profession or ethnicity

4. Advertising should not perpetuate gender based discrimination because of skin colour

The ASCI guidelines will severely change the scripts for advertising in the category, forcing creative professionals into exploring new and honest routes to get the consumers' attention.

However, we must underline that the ASCI is only a 'self regulatory, voluntary organization of the advertising industry' and guidelines such as this require advertisers to comply voluntarily; there are no government laws at present on advertising of fairness and skin lightening ads.