Advertisements are an unavoidable part of all our lives. We see them in newspapers, on television and while we drive. You would think, then, that they would be a correct representation of the Indian people. Yet that is not the case at all. Pick any advertisement, and it will most likely have a random non-Indian person featured. I saw a catalogue for a housing project the other day and every single person in it was a white person who was not Indian.
What is more bizarre is the fact that most Indians do not care. This insensitive approach can be credited to the obsession of Indian society with fair skin. The million fairness products that we have are akin to this disgusting belief. Not only is this crazy obsession baseless, it is racist and extremely unfair. It starts from birth, when relatives comment “Oh! Thank God, this child took the right colour from its parents,” the ‘right’ colour always meaning white. It does not stop there. Matrimonial sections in newspapers are filled with bigoted adverts that say, “Wanted: A fair skinned girl….” Girls think it is their duty to be fair, else they call themselves ‘wheat complexioned”- God knows what that even means. This obsession extends to the male species as well; all the male fairness creams are proof of that.
It is high time we stop judging people and drawing out their lives based on colour. Colour is no parameter to measure a person’s potential. It is just a matter of chance. Saying “Dark is Beautiful” does not help deal with the issue. Entirely disregarding colour is what will help. Let us stop with this primitive nonsense already.
