Beef Vindaloo

Animal rights activist group, PETA, are protesting against cellular phone giants Vodafone for alleged mistreatment of their mascot, the famous pug, Chika. According to the rights group, the cellular phone giants are taking undue advantage of the fact that dogs are colour blind by constantly changing the colour and name of their brand. Unfortunately, say PETA, what the company do not realise is that not only is the change of colour damaging for the dog but the constant change in identity is mentally traumatic to the pup as well. The group say that Chika is having to seek psychiatric help in order to deal with its identity crisis.

“You have to realise that just because they are not human does not mean they do not feel the feelings we feel,” said PETA India Director Joseph Kamalia, “what the poor little pup is going through is not something that is laughable. She has no idea neither what she is anymore nor what is expected of her either.” According to Kamalia, the pup is well aware of the fact that she captured the heart of the nation as the Orange pup. She is aware that she was the only reason that Orange did so well and she was far more important that the boy in the Orange ads, a fact that can be corroborated by the fact that the little brat is nowhere to be seen anymore. According to PETA, the change over to being the pink Hutch pup was not easy for the little pup to handle. Things would have been alright but the company continued the mistreatment by changing her over to the red Vodafone pup, a move that could well be considered the proverbial last straw.

Vodafone India Chief Harit Nagpal denies any wrong doing with the former Orange, then pink Hutch and currently Vodafone red pug pup. “We realise how important the pup is to our entire campaign and all these allegations are absolutely baseless and false,” he said, “we have ensured that every time the pup is used in a commercial, her owners, trainers, physios, marketing team, PR team and a trained clinical psychologist are always close at hand.” This fact, corroborated by all involved has been rubbished by PETA as being “trivial.” According to the rights group, if the company actually cared about the pup, they would put the pup’s needs before profiteering. “If the pup’s mental health actually mattered to the company, they would not have changed their branding so often in the first place.”

Market analysts are worried that this uproar could cause a veritable with hunt where using cute animals as corporate mascots are concerned. They say that if the media gives any sort of importance to this debate then every company would have to think long and hard before they decide to hire a four-legged friend to help peddle their wares.

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