ASCI pulls up Dish TV for misleading ad

The Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) has pulled up DTH service provider Dish TV for a misleading advertisement claiming to have 50% of market share.

The Consumer Complaints Council (CCC) of the ASCI that takes up complaints against advertisements across sectors, has upheld a complaint against Dish TV's ad that claimed -- "Half the nation loves Dish TV".

"The CCC concluded that as the TRAI data states, Dish TV has a max 31.6% of the market share, the claim, Half the nation loves Dish TV, is misleading," ASCI said.

The advertising watchdog has asked the company to modify the same.

Comments from Dish TV could not be immediately obtained.

Dish TV in its advertisement that appeared on some newspapers earlier this year claimed that 50 per cent of all paid DTH owners in the country have a Dish TV connection. It had quoted Indian Readership Survey (IRS) data of Q2 2010.

IRS is only a survey report that is neither comprehensive nor accurate, ASCI observed.

"IRS data or any data published by a private organisation can therefore not be relied on as an authentic source of information," ASCI said.

In contrast, any data that has been publicly acknowledged by the DTH operators and that has been reported to the sectoral regulator can be considered as a bona fide source, it added.

According to the ASCI, TRAI has reported the installed subscriber base for the second quarter of the calendar year 2010 as 23.77 million.

The earnings release published by Dish TV for the same quarter indicate a gross subscriber base of 7.5 million which translates to a market share of 31.6 per cent.

"In light of the above, the campaign is false and factually incorrect," the ASCI added.