Rahul Gandhi

ver since I blogged in support of Anna Hazareji, I have been flooded with e-mails. And the strangest of these came from a newly launched ad agency, Sutchi aur Sutchi. Now, considering their “grand proposal”, I went to their website sutchiaursutchi.com to learn a bit more about the outfit. Well, I must say I was initially quite impressed. Their motto, ‘Sutch ke bina aur kutch nahi’, immediately struck a chord although the fact that they had a team of 40 “copyrioters” wasn’t too inspiring. Anyway, I immediately turned my attention to the proposal signed by XX, the managing director. Now, you may think this is a rather peculiar name but research by my special cell in the Congress (assisted by the crime branch) revealed that his real name was Nurav Ihdnag (that’s my cousin Varun’s name spelt backwards). After his father retired from the air force, he rechristened him as Ex-Ex which he later shortened to XX after a numerologist divined that his lucky number was 20 and came up with the ingenious suggestion that a double X in Roman numerals equalled ten plus ten.

So what did Mr XX have to offer? As the young leader of a party (which swears by icons like Mahatma Gandhi), he wanted me to be part of a public service advertising campaign to promote fasting. “If we promote the idea of people foregoing at least one meal a day, it would lead to huge savings,” Mr XX wrote in his opening note. Frankly, I thought it a preposterous idea although I found it amusing enough to share it with the world.

Slogans and visuals for a three-part TV ad campaign ran thus: ‘Life in the Fast lane!’ was the first. (I am in a sports car driving round-the-clock without eating at pit stops. The special kurta I wear would be designed by Christian—or Hindu if I preferred that—Dior). Then there was ‘Push. Play. But Fast Forward!’ (I listen to music endlessly and finally say this one-liner to the camera, “If music be food for the hungry, let it be loud”). And finally “Fast- track your breakfast, lunch and dinner” (I’m supposed to sit right through breakfast, lunch and dinner without eating a morsel). Well, well rather clever but I felt it wouldn’t work although XX pointed out in his note that various slimming centres had agreed to sponsor the ads. “Fasting is better than any form of dieting and is less sweaty than exercising so a lot of people are excited,” is how he put it.

But XX didn’t stop with the ads. He also had a concept note for zero-calorie fast-food burgers. To quote: “These will be made from glazed cardboard and will look like the real thing and will come with a zero- calorie sauce. A Mumbai-based firm (Duggal & Duggal) has even agreed to mass-produce it, provided they can brand it as McDuggal.”

I thought of the entire campaign and suddenly felt hungry. Sorry XX, I see no reason why I should skip breakfast, lunch and dinner. Perhaps I’m happy being an Amul Baby.

(As imagined by Ajith Pillai)