Advertising industry watchdog Advertising Standard Council of India (ASCI) has upheld complaints against 87 advertisements in August, including those of HUL, Airtel and LG, terming them “misleading”.
According to the Customer Complaints Council (CCC) of the ASCI, of the 87 advertisements against which complaints were upheld, 37 belonged to the personal and healthcare category, followed by 41 in the education category and 9 from other categories.
The CCC has pulled up Hindustan Unilever Ltd (HUL) for advertisement of its water purifier product ‘Pureit Ultima’.
“The TVC of Pureit Ultima claims, ‘Pureit Ultima RO+UV. Sirf is mein hai Purity Indicator jo saaf saaf dikhata hai ki paani kitna pure hai' (only this has a purity indicator which how clean the water is), which was false and misleading. Furthermore, the print and website ad claims, ‘Pureit Ultima with Purity Indicator. Purity you can see!’ was misleading by implication,” ASCI said.
Similarly, complaint against LG Electronics was upheld as its advertisement claims “India’s only true water purifier which was not adequately substantiated”. Complaint against Bharti Airtel was upheld for its Airtel Broadband advert claiming “offer of Airtel Broadband 60 GB @ Rs 1,099 with unlimited calls, was not substantiated with evidence of the customers who have availed this scheme.”
Regarding an ad of VLCC, ASCI said the claims were considered misleading. “The claims in the advertisement, ‘Listen to your DNA for weight loss. Presenting for the first time VLCC DNA Slim a scientific weight loss solution based on your DNA’, ‘Running 4KM daily helped your colleague Lose weight’.