Narendra None-3: Unshakling An Elephant (Indian)!

By S.Narendra 

(S Narendra,  former Director  General, DAVP & ex- Executive  Director, R.K.Swamy-BBDO and 

later Spokesperson, Government of India)

India’s impressive economic growth rate since the 1991 economic liberalization has attracted world -wide attention. Now most economic commentators while referring to this development, compare India to an elephant and the Indian establishment has come to relish this. But this was not so initially and it required quite a push to persuade the political establishment

The author

that India’s economic stride should be compared to the elephant’s measured gait (Gajagamana) rather than to a tiger’s sprint, given its size and the ponderous democratic processes pushing the economy. A headline given to a PM speech:  “India to be Asia’s Growth Engine” invited protests from external affairs ministry, as the Mandarins thought that such aspirations would hurt sentiments of Asian neighbours. Many influential persons were upset that in July 1991, the government advertising  displayed  an “Unshackled Elephant” as the mascot for  the dramatic, dismantling of 34-year-old official controls( (IDRA or Industrial Development & Regulation Act) on business and industry.  Read on how   the tiger lost out   to the elephant.......

Background:  India’s industrial policy was laid down under the Industrial Development Regulation Act (IDRA) of 1956. It was over laden with   a philosophy of import substitution, self reliance, with quantitative restrictions on the amount of goods to be produced by an  industrial licensee entrepreneur. FDI or foreign direct investment was not allowed to own enterprises but could provide licensed technology.  Almost anything to do with business and industry was overseen by some or the other government authority.  This came to be referred to as the ‘licence-permit raj’ (as described by Dr Rajagopalachari,). A few business houses managed to corner licences for new industries and capacities for production in order to restrict supplies and control both the market and the price. And the private sector came to loathe competition, as it benefitted from a sellers’ market.

The political instability prevailing from October 1989 to 1991 in New Delhi had sent the national growth rate and nation’s morale to southwards as never before. Reportedly, there was a considerable flight of capital from India fearing a financial collapse. I was privileged to have access to the internal confidential briefings given to PM and select top leaders of the previous two governments bringing home the dire situation and steps to save the economy. Both the governments ignored such warnings, resulting in India having to pledge abroad its gold reserves to save its reputation.

A Caged Tiger: The London based Economist weekly in its April 1991, in a special section on India, depicted it as a caged Tiger. The Ambassador car that was ubiquitous on Indian roads in many ways symbolized the controlled economy in which quality and competition mattered little. It recounted the many lost economic opportunities due to inward looking Indian policies and contrasted this with the spectacular growth rates registered by East Asian economies like, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore and Hong Kong, (as South East Asia Correspondent for five  years, I had reported their progress)  and even China which had opted for open trading and investment policies.  They came to be known as ‘Tiger Economies’.  Indian policy makers wanted the Tiger branding, even while wedded to policies of a bygone era.

New Congress Government: P.V. Narasimha Rao became prime minister in late June 1991 and his first few statements clearly indicated that the government had no option but to initiate drastic steps for saving the economy. Taking such statements and the hints in the poll manifesto, I prepared a note on a communication strategy outlining the tasks to be undertaken by Doordarshan, AIR, DAVP, PIB and other media units of the Information and Broadcasting ministry, in the wake of any bold policy changes and sent it to the Secretary of the ministry. In response, I received it back with a mild rebuff!

Meanwhile, I was summoned to attend a meeting in Prime Minister’s Office convened by his special  secretary, Surinder Singh, and attended by officials of the finance ministry including N.K.Singh. I was asked to be ready to launch a campaign for educating the people about the economic crisis and the likely unpopular measures the government will take. But no one knew what those steps were at that stage.

Having attended such meetings held during previous governments, I was not sure that this government would bite the bullet and, therefore, asked: “Are you sure the government would act? How much bad news can we give the people?”

N.K. Singh shot back: “What other alternative the government has?  Work on   a publicity plan,  don’t  ask questions”.

“Elephant Unshackled”: Few persons expected Rao and his  minority government to unleash politically heretical   measures such as drastic devaluation of  the Indian rupee by a whopping 27%, and  scrapping of  the  Industrial Development Regulation Act.

The 26^th of July 1991 was a red letter day, when the Indian entrepreneurial spirit won its freedom. The announcement of abolition of IDRA by the Industry ministry headed by prime minister Rao, came in the afternoon, taking everyone by surprise, as it meant reversal of  Nehruvian model of economic development.

The officials in the finance and industry ministry were very busy and did not have time for us in DAVP for offering a brief for a communication campaign. Often in DAVP we were both an agency as well as a client and cannot wait for the client ministry to give us a brief. In fact, we had to wake them up to their communication needs. More often than not, we had to scramble up a campaign overnight.

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As   I was used to this   situation,   I prepared   a brief for guiding my creative team and asked them to come up with their ideas within the next few hours for releasing advertisements and outdoor campaign as well as a folder for explaining the significance of the government’s historic decision. When I returned to office after dinner to look at my team’s ideas, they presented me a tiger and even a peacock as the mascot for the   campaign that had no precedent.

I suggested that they come out with a visual matching the tag line ‘Elepahnt Unshackled’. We toyed with the idea of two elephants, one in chains and the other breaking out of them, but settled for an unshackled elephant, with its trumpeting trunk. I took a great risk by not putting the creative ideas through the political and bureaucratic channels for approvals that would   have delayed the campaign by several weeks. I tasked my outdoor team to get to work with the creatives and put up hoardings in New Delhi before the next evening, i.e.27^th of July. This was followed up with newspaper Ads and cinema slides. I was happy to note that newspapers noticed the message in the hoardings, reproduced the “Unshackled Elephant” and even favourably commented on it. I & B minister Ajit Panja complemented me for the promptness with which DAVP had moved   the campaign.

The PMO had set up a high level steering committee under the prime minister’s principal secretary for   overseeing the roll –out of economic reforms. The Secretary of I&B ministry was a member of this committee and he had been asked to attend its first meeting. He suddenly remembered my note on communication strategy for economic reforms telephoned me with a request that I should meet him with that note. We met and prepared for the steering committee meeting. I was co-opted as an invitee. I took the opportunity to get the stamp of approval (post facto, of course!) of this committee for using the elephant as the mascot   and the tagline for our communication campaign. No one paid any attention to the ad design and passed it quietly though!

I didn’t realize then that the issue of the mascot and the tag line was still an open issue. A few months later I was summoned by PMO to make a presentation to the PM himself about the work we had done and about the campaign plan for reforms agenda. (There is a separate story about this first encounter with the PM). During the presentation, I had showed the Ads with unshackled elephant released to media and no one offered any comments, making me assume that the mascot and tagline had been approved.

A few days later, the PM was taking another meeting in which several cabinet ministers were present, Out of nowhere, the Human Resource Development minister Arjun Singh (who was  expressing his opposition to PM’s economic reforms) pointed towards me and told Narasimha Rao that I was not projecting the reforms properly and  had used the elephant, not the  tiger, as the mascot. He further said that I should be asked to change the mascot. A major private Ad agency working for the Education ministry , I later learnt,  appears to  have  brought up this idea to the minister.

PV, without showing much reaction, asked me to explain my position. I clarified that tiger as   symbol of fast economic progress had been over used by south east Asian nations,   As they were small compared to India and were oligarchic not democratic like India, where processes were long.

It would be proper to use the elephant as the mascot, especially once India starts moving its impact would be global. Further, India had traditionally been a habitat of the elephant and we even have a elephant god. India should be different from east Asain story’

The Prime Minister, without even batting an eyelid, said “I agree’

I heaved a sigh of relief, as I had taken the risk of running the campaign  for several weeks under the tagline Unshackled Elephant, without subjecting it to the usual long-winding official processes.

(For those interested in reading more on how government advertising works under  severe handicaps should I recommend Pictures in Our Mind that deals with Canadian government advertising agency, a model adopted by India in setting up DAVP in 1950s).