Zomato's 'Kachra' Ad Is Wake-up Call For Brands To Not Invisibilise Caste

Zomato has been served a notice by the National Commission for Scheduled Castes for its ad featuring the character "Kachra"

The backlash over a Zomato ad for its alleged casteist content, and the subsequent action by the National Commission for Scheduled Castes is a wake-up call for the Indian advertising industry to try and engage with socio-political realities and to not be oblivious to caste.

On Tuesday, the food delivery platform was served notice by the National Commission for Scheduled Castes for its ad featuring the character "Kachra". This was a week after the food delivery service withdrew the ad after a huge backlash over its portrayal of Kachra, drawing parallels with a character of the same name from the movie Lagaan. The ad showed a person, the same actor who played the role in the movie, as an inanimate object like a table or potted plant.

An ad meant to promote the message of recycling ended up causing outrage, with many calling it out as dehumanising and insulting to Dalits.

It's been a week since Zomato took down the ad, but the issue is clearly more than that. It was yet another reminder that advertising in India is often tone-deaf and continues to ignore our social context, which is why brands and businesses need to address the issue of caste better.