New Delhi, 13th June 2023: The food delivery service, Zomato, has been notified by the National Commission For Scheduled Castes for its recent advertisement on World Environment Day.
The advertisement depicted actor Aditya Lakhia who portrayed the character of ‘Kachra’ in the 2001 movie ‘Lagaan’. The advert draws a link between the character Kachra with ‘kachra’, which is the Hindi word for ‘garbage.’ Citizens across the country soon took to social media to point out the casteist angle to the campaign, which ultimately saw the company withdrawing the advertisement.
‘Unintentionally, we may have hurt the sentiments of certain communities and individuals. We have taken down the video,’ the company said. However, the authorities at the National Commission for Scheduled Castes confirmed that they would investigate the matter and issued a notice to Zomato founder Deepinder Goyal.
The advertisement portrays actor Lakhia as a lamp, paper, paperweight, watering can, and different types of jackets — the accompanying text detailing how much recycled ‘kachra’ was used to make each item.
While the character’s involvement was supposed to highlight the importance of wasting food and draw attention to the challenges faced by marginalised communities in society, it backfired on the company as they were accused of being ‘tone deaf’ by social media users.
