The advertisement, announcing the inauguration of a luxury tourist train, the Kolkata-Nalanda Maharaja Express by railway minister Mamata Banerjee, contained an erroneous map.
New Delhi is no more India’s capital. It has become part of Pakistan. Varanasi is now a part of Orissa. Kolkata and Gaya are two islands in the Bay of Bengal, and the north Indian city of Gwalior is now a part of Maharashtra.
Zapped? Well, these are some of the magical geographical transformations reflected in a full page advertisement published by Eastern Railways in almost all leading newspapers of the country on Saturday. The advertisement, announcing the inauguration of a luxury tourist train, the Kolkata-Nalanda Maharaja Express by railway minister Mamata Banerjee, contained the erroneous map that showed Delhi in Pakistan, where Lahore should be.
The ad has, understandably, left the Eastern Railways officials red-faced, and unleashed another round of the popular bureaucratic game known as ‘pass the buck’, with the officials scrambling to escape the wrath of the railway minister. They have laid the entire blame on the ad agency which was contracted to prepare the ad.
The chief PRO of Eastern Railways, Shamir Goswami, apologised profusely for the mistake while facing the media. “It is really a bad mistake. We apologise for it. We’ve suspended the ad agency concerned and also blacklisted them,” Goswami said.
According to him, while giving the assignment to the agency concerned, the Eastern Railways authorities had only provided them with route details, and not given them any map. “Therefore, it is they alone who are to blame for the mistake,” he said.
However, even if the mistake was on part of the advertising agency, can the Eastern Railways totally evade responsibility? When contacted, a senior Eastern Railways minister told DNA on condition of anonymity that although ad agencies often prepare railways advertisements, they cannot release it without final clearance from the railways. “In this case, it is evident that the official who cleared the advertisement did his work in a sloppy manner and hence the mistake was overlooked,” he said.
The BJP, meanwhile, has said that this misrepresentation in government advertisements was not a one-off thing. “Only two months ago, we saw the picture of a Pakistani general in an advertisement by the Women and Child Development (WCD). This just shows the apathetic attitude of the government towards important things like the country’s image and its representation,” said BJP’s newly appointed spokesperson Nirmala Sitharaman.
There was no word from Mamata Banerjee, but aides said that ‘Didi’ was furious. “This was an important project for her and to have its launch mired in controversy is not something she will forget in a hurry,” said an aide.
On the other hand, Sitharaman said, “Nothing short of the Prime Minister’s apology for this gross misrepresentation of India can satisfy the BJP.”
The train in the ad, the Kolkata-Nalanda Maharaja Express, will run from Kolkata to New Delhi via Gaya, Varanasi, Bandhabgarh, Khajuraho, Gwalior and Agra.
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
)
)
)
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}