SURF EXCEL- RANG LAAYE SANG

CAMPAIGN.

My controversial ad campaign would be Surf Excel’s Rang Laaye Sang

campaign that they launched in Holi 2019. The ad shows the festival of
Holi and how kids in the balcony throw colors and water balloons on
anyone that passes from their area. This one little girl on her bicycle
who’s wearing a white top provokes all the other children standing in
their balcony to throw colors at her and they do. After a point of time
their colors are finished so then she calls someone who’s been hiding,
turns out it’s her Muslim friend who couldn’t get dirty since he had to go
to the mosque to do his namaz, and she tells him that she’ll put colors on
him as soon as his prayers are over. This ad promotes Hindu-Muslim
bond and tells us that as long as you’re getting dirty to strengthen a
bond, getting ‘Daags’ is worth it, since you have surf excel to help with
them afterward. It ultimately suggests, ‘Agar kuch achha karne mein
daag lag jaaye toh daag achhe hain.’
Commenting on the campaign, Carlos Pereira, Regional Creative
Officer, Lowe Lintas, said "We felt the festival of Holi gave us the
opportunity to highlight the true spirit of togetherness. By making color
the medium of oneness, we could seamlessly bring forth the larger
thought of Rang Laaye Sang - a sentiment that kids truly believe in."
Backlash: Released on February 27, the video has already gained
15,733,113 views on Youtube till date making it one of the highest
viewed ad campaigns of all time. however, the campaign has faced the
wrath of users who feel that the ad is 'Hindu phobic' and controversial
and wants to showcase that Namaaz is more important than Holi. The
people who didn’t agree with the message of the Surf Excel Ad started a
hashtag called BoycottSurfExcel where they spoke about how the new
ad is wrong and how we should boycott Surf Excel if they continue to
promote such ‘wrong messages.’

Speaking about the ad and the backlash it is facing, communications

consultant on digital/social media marketing and PR Karthik Shrinivasan
said, “In the social media space, everything is a conversation because
big brands and people are merely part of the stream of conversations.”
Sharing his own views on the ad, Shrinivasan quipped, “I thought the
new Surf Excel ad was a lovely piece of work by Lowe Lintas. It made
me smile at the ingenuity of the little girl who helps her little friend,
while also tearing up a bit at the innocence with which children look at
each other, beyond the differences we adults create among ourselves.
Surf Excel has been doing similar ads using festivals as a backdrop, even
in Pakistan (done by Lowe Lintas India). The connecting link is, of
course, Daag Achche Hai.” He further added, “I do not understand the
pointless objections and controversy over the ad. If someone wants to
see the ad from their Hindu lens, then doesn't the ad show the girl
(presumably a Hindu) as a brave, intelligent, magnanimous and quick-
witted child? It shows her as a fantastic human being. That's worth
lauding if you care deeply about Hindu sentiments, I presume.”
Shrinivasan concluded, “The other objection is that they show Holi
colours as daag and that somehow is insulting Hinduism. I do not
understand this either. Holi may be a Hindu festival but it is not a pan-
Indian festival. For South Indians, Holi colours are nothing but daag
simply because they do not celebrate Holi. I won't even venture into
addressing the love-jihad angle given we are talking about children and
that argument is way too disgusting and demeaning to even refer to.”
Political Parties also got involved in this campaign as they wanted Surf
Excel to remove this campaign from social media and TV but the
company and the supporters of this TVC stayed strong. Surf Excel broke
the self -imposed barrier of not including religion into ad campaigns,
Surf has done well to capture the innocence and playfulness of kids and
communicate it well in their campaign. No wonder the film has been
lapped up by those on social media.