Kalyan Jewellers Forced To Pull Back Racist Ad, Aishwarya Blames The Creative Team

After Indian social media universe exploded into a frenzy over the 'apparently' racist ad by Kalyan Jewellers featuring Aishwarya Rai, the group has now announced a withdrawal of the campaign through their Facebook page.

Earlier, Aishwayra's press team has issued a statement, stating that the original image was modified by the creative and she never shot for the ad with an idea of the outcome.

The original photoshoot, according to her pr team, had a dark background. Here are the images for a comparison:

Filmibeat

The issue began once this original ad went viral yesterday. The advertisement depicted a 17^th century European noblewoman, portrayed by former Miss World Aishwarya Rai Bachchan. The ad was intended to invoke emotions related to beauty, elegance, aristocracy. But internet soon found another side of it, racism.

The image represents nobility from a bygone era, where the woman is seated comfortably and the child struggling to even stand properly, holds an over-sized umbrella for the lady. According to critics, the extremely fair skin of the lady in contrast to the dark complexion of the child cannot be just a coincidence! The ad makers had carefully crafted the ad in such a way to give it a certain visual effect. Well, putting it straight, the ad is not just racist but to some extent also encourages people¡¯s fancy around servitude.

Here are some other advertisements which will show how racist some ads can be :

Skin Whitening Creams

We would often hear our grandparents moan ¡®Oh she is dark-skinned, it will be difficult to find her a groom¡¯. The advertising companies just took advantage of that and produced skin lightening creams like ¡®Fair and Lovely¡¯ and ¡®Pond¡¯s White Beauty Cream¡¯ and played around with India¡¯s obsession with ¡®fairness¡¯.

fakingnews.firstpost.com

LMN Advertisement

This Indian LMN TVC, produced by the Parle Agro Corporation, has a blatantly racist subtext to it. It shows two Africans digging in the sand for water, when they spot a tap nearby, they ll it off and start using it as a shovel.

Ashton Kutcher Popchips Ad

This Popchips ad starring Ashtun Kucher stoked controversy when Kutcher was portrayed as an "Indian" man named Raj looking for love with brown makeup on his face! Perhaps this is one of the worst ways to sell potato chips.

Business Insider

Intel Ad

This image of six muscular black runners bowing in front of a white man dressed up in a business attire under the title ¡®maximize the power of your employees¡¯ is definitely racist.

gizmodo.com