ADS: The Statue of Liberty gets a bindi

That's a billboard for Jet Airways, just outside Penn Station, in New York (thanks to Sendhil Revuluri). AnimalNewYork tried to summon some mock patriotic disgust--"Indian Airline Hates America, Liberty"-- but gave up pretty fast.

A bindi on Lady Liberty! And right outside Penn Station! While you're at Jet Airways, "India's finest international airline,"why don't you dress her in a sari (well actually, she kinda already is), step on her toes, and extinguish her torch right after lighting Old Glory on fire with it? EvilDoers! Don't you know America is at war? With, like, all of Asia? We push a button, and your WHOLE COUNTRY becomes a tarmac! Boycott Jet Airways! Boy...nevermind. Is the billboard at all offensive? Insensitive? Me, I don't think so. Tattoo Vishnu on LL's ass, I don't care. Maybe it's offensive to Indians?

Um... no? I really can't imagine any Indians--at least no one in India--being offended by this (the Statue, that is, not the Vishnu concept). In fact, having worked in advertising in India for several years, I can guess with some confidence that this exact idea has been used by the Indian ad industry umpteen times.

Comments

[Jaya Kamlani]

Despite all the things that were hurled at me the last time I stood up for Lady Liberty, I will say this once again: We all need to respect each country's symbols. Just because Jet Airways puts a Bindi on Lady Liberty's forehead, it does not make it right. Some of the Indians in India have gotten too cocky of late.

We should not be adorning Lady Liberty's forehead with a Bindi, just as we would not like anyone to put on a Texan hat on Gandhiji's statue.

Jaya Kamlani

[Srinivasa Raghavan]

If southwest airlines was to offer a houston-delhi flight, I think it would be rather amusing if there was a likeness of Gandhi with a cowboy hat.

[Jaya Kamlani]

There we go again Srinivasan, you and me commenting on this subject.

So okay, you like the image of Gandhi with a cowboy hat. Now that cowboy Gandhi would need a pair of boots. Wouldn't you say so? And he will need a pair of jeans and a buttoned up shirt. The image does not look like the Gandhi we revere.

I like my Gandhi dressed like a resolute hermit who knows where he is going in his dhoti, staff-in-hand and eyeglasses. On the other hand, if he is flying from Houston to Delhi, he might just board the plane dressed as a cowboy for the day, or they might stop him at the Security checkpoint in his traditional garb.

Jaya Kamlani

[Srinivasa Raghavan]

I wonder if jaya kamlani and Pandit Jugal Kishore Shastri are nothing more than alter egos of the bigwigs... i mean Sree Srinivasan and Arun Venugopal.... a kind of way for them to put out a little absurdity on this thread. I figure that is the only way to understand the above reply.

[Jaya Kamlani]

Srinivasa, I am no alter ego of any bigwig or editor. I speak for myself. I am drawn more to people who do things for others than for themselves, and am not attracted to ego-driven people.

I think you just love to pick a fight. And speaking about the Pandit, you seemed to have a good rapport with him on the forum. Sometimes I even thought you were one of his avatars, but then I compared the writing style and substance, and it was different. The forum readers know what I think of the pandit. I wish he would stay down under and never resurface to comment on the forum.

My first comment on this article was meant to be serious. But since you gave it a funny twist, I indulged in your satire and stretched it further to show how out-of-character Gandhi would look as a cowboy, just as how absurd it is to see a bindi on Lady Liberty. Same parallel.

Jaya Kamlani

[panditjugalkishoreshastri]

to die is the fate of a man but to die with a lingering and 'pandering' anguish is generally his folly. the dust tracks of goan or houston airports don't make a difference despite silver spurs on cowboy boots and borrowed portuguese sarpotel dish. Gods of good foods reveal themselves only to each other and not to the sarpotel men of the caves of e. m. forster.

[Jaya Kamlani]

Let us not forget what the statue of Lady Liberty stands for: It stands for liberty/freedom. Many have given their lives for the freedom of America and elsewhere in the world. There are many people in other countries - such as Tibet, Myanmar and communist regimes - who would give anything for their personal freedom.

Indian advertising companies play around with the image of Lady Liberty as if it were a brainwave/smart idea, but in fact it comes across as a ridicule. I can't believe so many Indian-Americans who have read the last posting of the bindi on Lady Liberty and this posting have not reacted. It appears they find the bindi on Lady Liberty rather amusing. Or, have they become so complacent to accept whatever is being fed to them by the press and the advertising companies? I find it disrespectful to treat a country's symbol in this manner.

The garb worn by Lady Liberty does NOT resemble a sari, much as many Indians would like to believe. It is the attire worn by the ancient Greek and Roman olympians, who carried a torch to promote friendship among the countries of the world. That's why Lady Liberty carries the torch of freedom and friendship, because New York has been the gateway to immigrants from all over the world. It is not only the Indians who have arrived at this port. For the last couple of centuries, many Europeans arrived here before Indians did, as did Africans, Chinese, Japanese, and others at other ports of America. What makes the Indians think they have the right to alter a country's symbol when many immigrants arrived in America way before them?

Jaya Kamlani

[shahabuddin kababwala]

some have freedom thrust on them like india; some acquire it; some have freedom taken away from them because they are unfit for it despite lady liberty's promised embrace of the sick, the tired and the 'unfit.' the 'unfit' genre of freedom fighters stays in the slammer under lady liberty's watch based on multiple criteria, one being 'those mentally unfit shall not know liberty.' indians knew liberty long before portuguese knew how to use 'free' indian spices. therefore, long live liberty, and those undeserving of its merits, for, one of liberty's many manifestations is charity for those who don't deserve it. to most portuguese charity begins at home and ends where it begins.