On Monday, the women's wing of the Republican Party of India (A) demanded that an advertisement featuring Bollywood actress Sunny Leone promoting a condom brand be pulled down.
The secretary of Women's Wing, Sheela Gangurde said, "The advertising campaign objectifies the feminine gender and has proved to be a sheer embarrassment for all women viewers... It's a very ugly scene and conveys a very different message."
She further added that various television channels airing such commercials have made it awkward for the women in a household to sit together with the family and watch TV. "In fact, we have received scores of complaints from women viewers, women activists and others on the 'undesirable' content of this and even some other advertisements promoting condoms or contraceptives, and these should be banned," Gangurde further said.
Talking about the ugly manner in which such ugly content is aired, Gangurde added, "Shabby, immoral and ugly manner in which the actress seduces or sexually provokes a man in the ad to use condoms is nothing but serving immorality and a bad practice to the Indian audiences, hurting their moral ethos, ethics, religious and spiritual values."
Led by Union Minister Ramdas Athavale, the party has served a week's ultimatum to the government to initiate steps to withdraw the ad, failing which it would launch an agitation.
Watch the ad below:
