Endorsing Vimal Elaichi, a cardamom mouth freshener sold by the famous Gutkha brand, has landed Bollywood actors Shah Rukh Khan, Ajay Devgn, and Tiger Shroff in trouble, as Maharashtra’s Food and Drug Administration (FDA) under its Commissioner Tukaram Mundhe (IAS:2005:MH) has taken notice of it and issued show-cause notices to them for featuring in it.
Though Vimal Pan Masala or Gutkha is a separate product sold under the Vimal brand umbrella, the FDA believes that it is a case of “surrogate” or indirect advertising.
The FDA’s notice says that the use of the phrase “VIMAL Elaichi” appears to create an association with Vimal Pan Masala and may mislead consumers by indirectly promoting the brand identity of a product that is prohibited in Maharashtra.
The FDA has cited the Guidelines for Prevention of Misleading Advertisements and Endorsements for Misleading Advertisements, 2022, issued by the Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA).
According to consumer protection provisions dealing with misleading advertisements, if an endorsement is found to be misleading, endorsers may be slapped penalties ranging from Rs 10 lakh to Rs 50 lakh besides facing restrictions on future endorsements and could even be barred from promoting products for a period of up to three years.
The Bollywood actors have been asked to discontinue their participation in the campaign and remove related promotional content from their official social media accounts.
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