[Mauled In Translation] Coke’s Diwali ad featuring Warli art

Published by Karthik S on October 27, 2010 | 7 Responses

I’m sure you’ve seen the new Coca Cola TVC…the one featuring Warli art. This one…

I couldn’t get the Tamil version of this TVC online, but there are two things that seem MASSIVELY discordant in the transliteration.

1. The original TVC has the guy asking for ‘Dilli ki bus’ in a place that is either North East or Leh types. Why would the advertising agency change that dialog to merely ‘Chennai’ without changing the backdrop? Why can’t it be, for argument’s sake, a Tamilian asking for a bus to Delhi, in broken Hindi (to add nativity)? Are people in Tamil Nadu so stupid that they need to be shown a guy asking for a bus to Chennai – all across the damn country – from Leh? Is there even a bus like that? I’m sure the Telugu version has Hyderabad in it.

2. The jingle. The Hindi version has a funky reworking of O P Nayyar’s C.I.D classic, ‘Jaata kahaan hai deewane’. It sounds really good (wonder who sang it in the new form!), but in Tamil, it is mind numbingly transliterated. ‘Jaata kahaan hai deewane’ means, in coarse terms, ‘Where are you off to, O lover, you’ (!!). The Tamil jingle goes, ‘Enge nee pogindraai rasiga’, which is elementary school transliteration of the same words! Why can’t the agency use a Tamil film song that has a similar mood? They don’t have people with such skills? Ask online, for heaven’s sake – make a social media contest out of it…I’m sure they’d get tons of suggestions!

Oh wait…I understand. Budget constraints, to get the composer to do yet-another remix (and more, if you consider other languages this TVC is in)? If so, why not just leave it in Hindi? It’s after all a cult song and it’s not as if Tamilians have never ever heard Hindi songs – they’ve O P Nayyar fan clubs in Chennai too! And no, DMK’s first family will not send paid goons after the agency and Coca Cola for having a ‘Hindi’ song in an otherwise-Tamil TVC. If you want to add nativity, go the whole hog…if you can’t, just leave it at the rashtra basha level…we vernacs can understand and will still buy the drink.

Bheja…adequately mauled.

Article written by Karthik S

  • http://www.bhatnaturally.com/ bhatnaturally

    Same thing happened with their earlier ad featuring Kalki. Sigh.

  • http://twitter.com/arbitthoughts arbitthoughts

    I was told that the Idea banyan tree ad with the “Aap pre-ped hain ya post-ped” was transliterated as is to Tamil. So this didn’t really shock me :) .

  • http://paperwork.co.in/ Manoj Kandasamy

    Yea karthik. Felt the same too. Even my friends from non-advertising (I.e real consumers) felt its so stupid.

    I dont see any reason why Coke have to think about BUDGET constraints in a market like India!

  • Blogeswari

    Hey Karthik

    What does one do when the Parul, Poojas and Pandays in the agencies insist on the language versions being literal translations of the Hindi ones?Oh, am not for a moment supporting the Chembur writers but having ‘tried’ to write in Tamizh for these agencies let me tell you that in 99% of the cases, the agency duds insist on listening to the transcreated Tamizh / regional language scripts and make changes to make it a literal word to word translation… like in this one!

    In very rare cases, where a CD like say Chax , Pops or a Balki is directly involved in the language versions, do we get good stuff in the Tamizh/ Telugu versions.

    • http://itwofs.com/beastoftraal/ Karthik Srinivasan

      That is such a sorry state and attitude towards regional languages. Guess we could alert rabid state-level parties and goons and get them to protest against horrendous transliteration ;-) If not the agency, at least the client brands will start insisting on decent translations, in sheer fear or instigating violence!

  • Sriram Mohan

    They could have just said “veedu” instead of “Chennai”. Strange that it occurred to no one in the agency that, well, Chennai isn’t home to all Tamilians :) .

  • Astral_pilgrim

    am tamil n wantd to download mp3 hindi version and came across this page. yes, the zest and festivity of the hindi version was lost in tamil ad.