Amitabh Shukla
Is the surname Gupta synonymous with the trading community? The Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) thinks so. It has taken umbrage on an advertisement of the Custom and Excise Department of central government which carries the word “Gupta uncle” as being tax evader.
“Why didn’t the government use the first name of a person like Ramesh, Mahesh, Sohan etc. to make the advertisement instead of using the surname of a trading community. Today it is the Guptas who have been targeted, tomorrow it could be some other community,” said Praveen Khandelwal of the CAIT.
The ad, part of the revenue generation exercise of the government, shows a school kid informing his father that as suggested by him, he wrote an essay on 'honesty is the best policy' and that won him the award. Then he hears his father advising one Gupta for not declaring some tax related information. And then the son questions his father, "Papa, aap to kahate the 'Honesty is the best policy'. Phir Gupta Uncle ko yah salah kyo?" And the father is forced to think over. His son’s question haunts him.
“This is derogatory and should be immediately withdrawn,” the letters of several chambers of commerce and industry have said to the Finance Minister P. Chidambaram.
Following the representations, the ad was withdrawn on Thursday. An official of the Finance ministry said that the said ad and the representations came to the notice of the FM and he has directed to remove it with immediate effect. “The ad for revenue generation will appear but it will have changes and the reference to Gupta uncle would be definitely put out of it,” the official said.
The ad was not prepared by the DAVP, the government body which regulates and releases advertisements. It was a private advertisement agency. “We have not yet thought of any action against the said agency,” the official said.
DAVP Director, Swagata Ghosh told HT that the ministries are free to get the ads designed by private agencies or the DAVP. “This particular ad was designed by a private agency and only released through us,” he said.
The apex body of the trading organisation had given a deadline of November 30 to the government for withdrawing the controversial ad. They would now have to applaud the government for the timely action instead of a nationwide agitation which was planned earlier.
Khandelwal said that they would have objected even if some other community had been named and targeted by the ad. “Our Constitution forbids this kind of discrimination on the basis of caste,” he asserts. (2005)
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