August 26, Tuesday: The iconic Amul Girl, whose wide-eyed look of innocence, red polka-dotted dress, and astringent one-liners have been part of the nation's collective imagination for years, has again been in the spotlight not for her clever marketing copy but because of a viral claim about who in real life inspired the mascot. A trending Instagram reel by marketing expert Dr. Sanjay Arora positioned the mascot as being based on a childhood photo of Shobha Tharoor Srinivasan, sister of Congress MP Shashi Tharoor- Watch here.
Yet the Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), which sells Amul, has categorically stated that this is not so. The mascot, they emphasized, was designed by Sylvester daCunha and illustrator Eustace Fernandes, and was developed in 1966 and not named after any member of the Tharoor clan.
An Instagram video alleged she resembled Shobha Tharoor. Shobha herself replied X mentioning that she and her sister Smita had actually been "Amul babies" in initial campaigns, with acclaimed director Shyam Benegal shooting them. However, she was not sure if her picture was the direct inspiration behind the cartoon icon. Shobha Tharoor Srinivasan.
Origin story of the mascot
Sylvester daCunha and Eustace Fernandes are credited by the author of the re-released Amul's India Book with creating the Amul Girl mascot in 1966. The mascot was conceived out of a need to have a more mischievous, contemporary character for outdoor advertisements, totally different from the softer look of Polson Butter's mascot.
Briefly, though the Tharoor sisters have a warm and early association with Amul's advertising past, it's the innovative design team of daCunha and Fernandes that really gave birth to the ubiquitous "utterly butterly" mascot loved by generations.
