Concerns against Big B’s alliance with Horlicks puts back focus on celeb endorsers

Once again bringing to the fore the issue of the role and responsibilities of celeb brand endorsers is the opposition to Amitabh Bachchan’s association with Horlicks’ Mission Poshan. 

GSK Consumer Healthcare recently rolled out Horlicks Mission Poshan with Amitabh Bachchan as the campaign ambassador. Supporting the Government’s Rashtriya Poshan Abhiyaan, Horlicks Mission Poshan will focus on the first 1,000 days of a child with the objective of addressing malnutrition, stunting and infant mortality. Bachchan will be part of many activities planned all-round the year, including a 12-hour live Telethon and awareness camps across schools and villages. 

Now, a nutrition advocacy group, Nutrition Advocacy in Public Interest (NAPi) has written an open letter to Bachchan, urging him not to associate with Horlicks Mission Poshan. In the letter, NAPi states, “Horlicks is a high sugar product, as 100 gram of a popularly advertised pack of Horlicks Delight, contains 78 gram of carbohydrates of which 32 grams is sucrose sugar. This is harmful for children as it may contribute to childhood obesity and non communicable disease in later life. We hope you are aware that WHO recommends a reduced daily intake of free sugars throughout the life course to less than 10% of total energy intake. Furthermore, in the interest of good health WHO suggests intake of free sugars to below 5% of total energy intake.” 

The open letter further states, “We believe that this campaign is misleading and undermines optimal nutrition. Big food companies are known to adopt marketing tactics that build brands by entering through the back door. Horlicks, in this case, is championing the cause of nutrition.” 

When contacted by Adgully, Dr Arun Gupta, Convener, NAPi, explained, “I feel the problem of malnutrition cannot be solved in our country by just a campaign. The BJP manifesto promised that their government will eliminate child malnutrition and provide the needed resources. So, we expect the government to have appropriate policies and programmes to address this complex issue. These big food companies, including Horlicks, have no role to play because such campaigns just help them grow their businesses.” 

The letter adds, “You may be aware that undernutrition mostly creeps into the resource poor households. We fear that this campaign will influence families and children from these families to buy Horlicks assuming it is a good nutritious product as you are behind it. Horlicks is expensive, may displace real family foods. Thus, your association with Horlicks is unlikely to achieve the objective of curbing undernutrition in India.” 

 Earlier, Bachchan had ended his 14-year association endorsing brand Pepsi in 2014 due to concerns raised about the health impact of aerated beverages on children. The letter points out this and adds, “We also believe such an association will negatively impact your image of being a socially concerned artiste. Therefore we request you to call off the association with Horlicks immediately in public interest.” Incidentally, last year Virat Kohli, too, took the decision not to renew his deal with Pepsi as he felt that he could not endorse any product that he himself would not use. 

This is not the first time that Bachchan has been under the scanner for endorsing a product deemed harmful for consumption. One would recall the time when Nestle’s Maggi faced flak for having lead and MSG content in excess of the permissible limits and had to be withdrawn from the market. At that time, brand endorsers Bachchan and Madhuri Dixit also had to face flak due to their association with Maggi. There was a lot of debate at that time on the role and responsibilities of celeb brand endorsers. 

Given the huge hue and cry raised, several Bollywood celebs such as Anushka Sharma, Kangana Ranaut, Ranbir Kapoor, Nandita Das and Randeep Hooda have taken a stand that they would never endorse fairness cream brands and similar products. 

While the concerns raised about the high sugar content in products like Horlicks is genuine and very relevant, one wonders what steps such advocacy groups have taken so far to address this issue and create mass awareness. Has Amitabh Bachchan’s association with the brand given the issue the much needed impetus? And in case Bachchan does bow out of the association with Horlicks Mission Poshan, will it force Horlicks to re-look at the sugar content in the product? After all, Horlicks has been a part of Indian homes for several decades now and is heavily advertised across media platforms, where mothers are shown giving their kids their daily dose of nutrition boost with Horlicks. And what about other such milk additive nutrition brands like Bournvita, Complan, Boost?