Airtel Digital in the dock after Tata Sky complaint

The Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) has upheld a complaint by direct-to-home TV operator Tata Sky against Airtel Digital. Tata Sky had complained recently that Airtel's claims of superior picture quality were not substantiated. ASCI has now asked Airtel Digital for an explanation.

In a letter to ASCI secretary-general Alan Collaco in November last year, Tata Sky charged that the ad aims to portray that Airtel Digital TV, with its use of MPEG 4 DVB-S2 technology, has better picture clarity than other service providers. The commercial, launched last August, ''falsely suggests that other platforms have inferior picture quality'', it added.

''MPEG-4 and DVB S2 are compression standards and have no impact on video picture quality. We want to correct the myth in the minds of the consumers that MPEG-4 DVB S2 provides better picture quality than other technologies used to provide digital signals,'' said Tata Sky chief marketing officer Vikram Mehra.

Tata Sky and Dish TV, the top two DTH operators, use MPEG2 technology, while the remaining DTH operators, including Sun Direct, Digital TV, Big TV and D2H, use MPEG4 technology. Though compression technologies determine a service provider's number of channels to consumers, they have no impact on video quality.

Airtel Digital Television launched two commercials titled Dil Titli featuring Bollywood stars Saif Ali Khan and Kareena Kapoor which focussed on the clarity card.

The ASCI, in its final hearing last week, upheld the Tata Sky complaint, and may soon ask Airtel to modify or withdraw the campaign, say reports.