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Thursday, October 2, 2014

Swachhta!

She sighs, tired from a long day, and sits down to scribble a few lines in to her journal.
She rarely does that. Something really profound must have happened.

May 2nd 2012,

My cousin and his kids came home from the U.S. of A last week. I ve been spending a lot of time with them.

Cute kids, they have a lot of energy,so many stories to share, it is so much fun being around them.. Well the younger one is a peach, the kid is in that place where they learn to talk, precious right?! 
Had a really long day. But one incident just baffled me.

My nephew was filling his 'Ben 10' fanny pack with wrappers from all the chocolates and ice creams he had. It was so full he started holding them in his tiny fists and  washaving difficulty holding the other things. 

So my cousin says 'Why aren't you throwing all the trash away?? Why are you collecting everything?' 

The kid complained, 'I couldn't find a trash can dad!'

For which he got a reply, 'No no, you need not search for a trash can , you can throw the wrappers here or for that matter anywhere!'

The kid obliged. What else would he do? He is four!!

Well thank god there was someone who cleaned up right behind him.

I grew up with 2 siblings who did not give any thought before throwing juice boxes, wrappers or cartons right in the middle of the road for 22 years. I even got into a huge fight with my brother over a Frooti bottle and didn't talk to him for hours and got into trouble with my parents for being arrogant, obnoxious and some other things I shouldn't even reveal here <Well, sounds stupid now I guess>. And today, this happens!!

Well I guess you tell and tell, but you only end up being such a bore to your own cousins and nothing ever changes!!


August 16th 2012,

It is one month since Tinku returned to India after her long trip from the U.S. of A, and I couldn't help but notice that she is being really clean about everything around her, conspicuously putting every juice box every small wrapper nowhere but in the nearest trash can.

I was very intrigued and grilled her for the reason [well my wicked plan was to work it on Pinku so he could change too.. ;) ] when she said that she was shamed by our nephew (the four year old with the fanny pack) in-front of his foreign friends. He said, and she quoted 'Se,e don't litter this place with all this plastic,if it is India, you can.. But you are not in India anymore,so here you ll have to put it in the trash can.'

Though I can't play this card on Pinku, it got me thinking. It took a long expensive trip and shaming by a four year old for Tinku to realize.. And the worst part is, she is educated and all!

I wish I could smack on Pinku's head and the keys fall in the right place, that would be so much easier!!



October 2nd 2014,

My cousin and his kids are visiting again. The kid threw some trash on the road.
I asked him to pick it all up and hold it till he finds a trash can when Pinku said, 'Well I don't know which India your father grew up in little fellow, but here, we don't do that anymore!'
He happily obliged!!  Well, he is just six, but he ll never do that again. Not here!

<This is not fiction. It is very much veridical!>

Might not be as moving, but we are literate and sensible right? 

So the next time you mindlessly stop to pee on the roads, realize that you are making approximately 60% of India's population vulnerable to cholera, diarrhea, typhoid etc..


The next time you drop a juice box on the roads, realize
that there thousands tourists who dread coming to India,well you are just slackening up the chance for a low paid employee to construct his own toilet.

The next time you spit on the road, the next time you throw a still- on-fire cigarette butt on the road, realize that there are many girls dropping out of the school because they don't have good sanitation facilities, you are robbing them of their future and dreams.

'Nirmal' or 'Swachh', good intentions can never let us down. 

Every effort to fulfill our duties is also patriotism.

I am that change. I hope you are too.. 

So we can meet on the other side where the grass is greener and India is cleaner!

Monday, April 7, 2014

The Art of Convincing People


Advertisements: A chance given to the viewers to follow two programs scheduled at the same time. 
Good Advertisements: It did what all ads are supposed to do: create an anxiety relieve-able by purchase.

Many experts on Advertising believe that a consumer has shut his brains to advertising in places he knows he is going to bombarded with various ads. Hence, today a marketer should try and reach his customer when he least expects it and in places most unlikely. This will help the brand to be registered in consumer's mind. As much as we can agree with this, a good and an innovative ad is what people are looking forward to these days. There have been some advertisements  for which I restrain myself from changing the channel. 

The Vodafone campaign of Zoo Zoos had a similar effect on many, and the feel- good Cadbury ads with impeccable looking fresh and pretty artists sure did. However, the government campaigns on increasing awareness scorned at. I can not defend  the 'Mukhesh Harane' ad as a warning against smoking. I mean, that is not the way to get people to stop from smoking, proven effective are the illustrations of disease effected organs on the very pack of the cigarettes in Australia,may be it is time we stringently followed that. However, I am able to make my peace with the new advertisements parading 'Quit Smoking'. They explicitly emphasize on Second hand smoking and appeal to the 'Pathos' of a quintessential Indian- the family. Well, this might actually have more impact than rotten lungs and surgical instruments on 75mm.


Of all the domains of influence and persuasion:: Ethos, Pathos and Logos.. The persuader, though free to use any strategy.the  persuadee always has an upper hand of making his own choice. Keeping that in mind, sensitizing the advertisements to cause awareness is in much of a necessity.

Well, this post is in praise of some advertisements that might actually have an eternal impact, well that would be exaggerating,they might actually have an impact on me for a really long time.  

Here is an advertisement that I loved in the recent times:: NACO (National AIDS Control Organisation)
The new campaign, launched on January 28, has been produced by BBC World Service Trust. NACO has spent a whopping Rs 7 crore to book air time on radio and TV channels for a month. The advertisements aired till February 28.


I am sick of all the advertisements where a lesson is taught by a voice we don't know[being taught, really?? Are we still not ready to show that some of us are already aware and empowered?]. This advertisement, made it a point that ::
  • People were already aware of the discrimination.
  • They did not actually 'exhibit' the ways of discrimination.
  • They have the courage to stand up to make a voice.
  • Once these are done, The rest do not have a choice but make way to change.
Though it might seem like these are but trivial issues, they attracted me a lot. There are no surgeries shown, no sick people shown. It only portrays the responsibility we have, to stand up and protect the people being looked down upon, with immense intellectual integrity. 

Well, this is the crux: You don't show what is wrong, in explicit detail, while it plays a major role in plot, what needs to be done is the main issue. It may as well lead to an attitudinal change that the ad is aiming at.

Though, wittily, they went towards a modern approach in FM advertisements and stuck to the more conservative path on Video advertisements in the campaign to promote condom usage. May be, that was for the best, not to fire up a debate on issues that were proven socially sensitive. 

Technically: The lighting, manipulation of camera angles with symbolically portraying the boss (once or twice) from the eyes of the employees caught my eye.

Well, one would but expect this from an advertisement aiming at social change. The not-so-recent Tanishq ad, a completely corporate endeavor took a completely different stand,not adorning a woman just because of the ornaments she wears. [The ad did not have the need to explicitly state the impending re-marriage,as it would have been a contrast and a misfit with the subtle] I must say, it was not elusive. Loved the colorist, and the step to move away from every possible stereotype. 


What can I say, Advertising is the life of Trade, and the very essence of Democracy.