Asinine, puerile vomit of an excuse for an ad

You have to check out the new Emami "Fair and Handsome" ad that's on the telly these days. A young man scampers around surreptiously in a ladies hostel. Is he a cross dresser looking for women's clothes? Is he a pervert looking for lingerie? Is he a peeping Tom looking for a steamy scene? Nope, he is a dark man looking for good old Fair and Lovely fairness cream. What drives this man to go through all this trouble rather than checking his friendly neighborhood medical store? Beats me. Is Emami trying to pass a subliminal message that ''Dark is dumb'' along with the ''Dark is ugly'' message? Maybe, they have a ''Fair and Handsome and Intelligent'' product coming up.

Anyways, the women get to know, scream and chase him. A passing male jogger and our dark desperado hide behind the flower pots to avoid the bashing to follow. Our innocent jogging partner is not mad about getting needlessly stuck in this jamboree but pissed at the fact that our dark desperado is a man and is still using women's fairness cream. Miffed and without his fix (of Fair and Lovely fairness cream), our dark desperado gets the Aakashvaani (divine voice from Emami) informing him of the Fair and Handsome product. Daily application of the same for 6-8 weeks and, voila, our dark desperado is transformed from his hideous decrepit dark self into a fair and handsome young man. He metamorphoses into a veritable chick magnet with cries of ''Hi Handsome'' from women rending the air.

Can anything be more dumb than this? A reality check is in order. If a man would enter a ladies hostel, he would be looking for fair and lovely and not ''Fair and Lovely''. Emami has made a whole business out of the Indian dark skin inferiority complex. The product is a stupid concept since it cures the wrong problem - the problem is in the mind not the complexion.

But this asinine, puerile vomit of an excuse for an ad makes me want to administer a can of whupass on the admen responsible for it.