In a clever move to dispel recent rumors of pig fat being used as one of the ingredients in Lays Chips (in Pakistan), the recent Lays TV commercial shows Junaid Jamshed, a role model for many, testifying to the ‘Kosher’ nature of these popular chips. According to Lays, the chips are in fact ‘Halal’ qualified from Saudi Arabia. The skeptics are still warning people in various blogs but the fact of the matter is that Lays’ claim is totally believable. A recent article in Time Magazine talks about how the Halal Food Industry has become a multi-billion dollar industry and is growing rapidly with most large international food companies branching into products that cater to this huge consumer segment. And it’s hard to believe that anyone but a suicidal madman would introduce pig fat coated chips in our schools, colleges and shops. How long do you think he’d last?

However, there is one irksome element to the ad. The end of the ad shows a slide which states that the commercial is in fact a Public Service Message from Lays. To double check, I looked up the definition of Public Service Message and here’s what Wikipedia says (all the other definitions were a close match):

A public service announcement (PSA) or community service announcement (CSA) is a non-commercial advertisement broadcast on radio or television, ostensibly for the public interest. PSAs are intended to modify public attitudes by raising awareness about specific issues. The most common topics of PSAs are health and safety.

It is obvious and totally understandable for a company to defend its product against bad press but does that constitute a  public service message? So I went and looked up the definition of ‘misrepresentation’ and this is what Dictionary.com had to say:

an intentionally or sometimes negligently false representation made verbally, by conduct, or sometimes by nondisclosure or concealment and often for the purpose of deceiving, defrauding, or causing another to rely on it detrimentally; also : an act or instance of making such a representation

Maybe not that bad… you decide. You can share your thoughts in the comments section below.