Advertisment

I Venkat elected new Chairman of ASCI

Leo Burnett's Arvind Sharma elected Vice-chairman and GroupM's Vikram Sakhuja reappointed as Treasurer.

author-image
BestMediaInfo Bureau
New Update
I Venkat elected new Chairman of ASCI

I Venkat elected new Chairman of ASCI

Leo Burnett's Arvind Sharma elected Vice-chairman and GroupM's Vikram Sakhuja reappointed as Treasurer.

Pallavi Goorha Kashyup | Mumbai | September 8, 2011

publive-imageAt a board meeting of The Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) held in Mumbai on Thursday, I Venkat, Director, Eenadu, was unanimously elected Chairman. As a member of the Board of Governors for five years, he has provided active support to self-regulation in the advertising industry.

Arvind Sharma, Chairman of India Sub-Continent, Leo Burnett, was elected Vice-chairman, and Vikram Sakhuja, CEO-South Asia, GroupM Media India, was re-appointed the Honorary Treasurer.

The other members of the new Board of Governors are:

  • Advertisers: Narendra Ambwani (Agro Tech Foods), Rajiv Dube (Aditya Birla Management Corporation), Shantanu Khosla (Procter & Gamble Hygiene & Health Care), Gopal Vittal (Hindustan Unilever);
  • Media: Rajan Anandan (Google India), Benoy Roychowdhury (HT Media) Advtg.
  • Agencies: Subhash Kamath (BBH Comms India), Srinivasan Swamy (RK Swamy BBDO).
  • Allied Professions: Dilip Cherian (Perfect Relations), Dhananjay Keskar (IBS), Pranesh Misra (Brandscapes Consultancy), Partha Rakshit (Partha Rakshit Associates).

Commenting on the development, Venkat said, “It is my honour to be elected as Chairman of an organisation which has been providing remarkable service to the Indian masses and ad industry by effectively self-regulating advertising content over the past 26 years. With the support of ASCI's Board and CCC, I will endeavor to further improve the awareness and usage of ASCI. I urge the ad sector, the regulators, civil society activists and, above all, the general public to actively seek ASCI's services and also provide suggestions for its improvement.”

Outgoing Chairman of ASCI, Rajiv Dube, Director-Group Corporate Services, Aditya Birla Management Corporation, said, “It has been a privilege for me to have served as Chairman of ASCI and I step down from the position with the satisfaction of a progressive year on self regulation in advertising behind me, for which I would like to thank all who supported strengthening the movement.”

During 2010-11, the Consumer Complaints Council (CCC) met 12 times and considered 777 complaints against 190 advertisements. Of these, complaints against 104 ads were upheld, while 80 were not upheld and six were considered non-issues. In 84 cases, the complaint upheld ads were voluntarily withdrawn or modified according to CCC's decisions resulting in over 80 per cent compliance rate.

ASCI is a self regulatory voluntary organisation of the advertising industry. The role of ASCI and CCC is in dealing with complaints received from consumers and industry against advertisements that are considered false, misleading, indecent and illegal, leading to unsafe practices, or unfair to competition, and consequently in contravention of the ASCI Code for Self-Regulation in Advertising.

Pallavi.Goorha@BestMediaInfo.com

Info@BestMediaInfo.com

Advertisment