New Delhi: We have been hearing or reading the common saying 'Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder'. The quote gives us an idea that anything and everything is beautiful, but is it really the way we think? Generally, the beholders find beauty only when they see a fair-skinned girl. This is an 'only' explanation for why women try so hard to be fair or why the sales of fairness products have been shooting up ever since they were launched.

ALSO READ| Unilever To Rebrand Itself After Major Backlash, Plans To Drop 'Fair' From Skin Care Cream

So the idea followed for hundreds of years is ' Only Fair is beautiful'. Some people might say it is racist but is it so? Then why does every fairness product advertisement shows that only being fair would help women meet the man of their dreams? Some even show that a good job or success for women is only possible if they have a white tone!

This obsession of being fair, mostly in India has given a huge market to products like 'Fair and Lovely', 'Ponds White Beauty Cream', 'White Tone', 'Garnier White', and a hundred others. According to Moneycontrol, the Indian fairness cream market was worth about $450 million in 2019, with Hindustan Unilever, Procter & Gamble, and Garnier (L’Oréal) being the major players. But a few days ago 'Fair and Lovely which has been the biggest contributor to the market of fairness products decided to bring a change.

 Courtsey: Garnier

HUL to drop 'Fair' From 'Fair and Lovely'

The company decided that it would stop promoting skin "whitening" or "lightning," and rebrand the skin-care line in response to critics who say the products promote harmful stereotypes around beauty and skin tone. "We recognize that the use of the words 'fair', 'white' and 'light' suggest a singular ideal of beauty that we don't think is right, and we want to address this," Sunny Jain, the president of Unilever's beauty and personal care division, said in a statement.

Other companies to stop racial filter

  • Johnson & Johnson: A week before Fair and Lovely decided to drop the 'fair' connotation, the American multinational company Johnson & Johnson decided not to sell fairness and skin-whitening products anymore.


Johnson & Johnson said that it will stop the sale of Neutrogena Fine Fairness cream, which is being sold in Asia and the Middle East, and Clean & Clear fairness cream, which is being sold only in India.

“Conversations over the past few weeks highlighted that some product names or claims on our dark spot reducer products represent fairness or white as better than your own unique skin tone. This was never our intention - healthy skin is beautiful skin,” a company spokesperson said in a statement.


The company added that its website and retailer pages are being updated to remove links to purchase these products.




  • Shadi.com: The matrimonial website removed an option that allowed users to search for potential partners on the basis of their skin tone after US-based Hetal Lakhani started an online petition against the option.


The matrimonial website said it was a "product debris we missed removing" and added that the filter "was not serving any purpose".

"The obsession with fair skin is still notorious within South Asian communities," wrote Hetal Lakhani in her online petition, which garnered over 1,600 signatures.

The Dark Roots Of Our Fair Obsession

For generations, it started from the day we decided to preach the devotional song 'Yashomati maiyya se bole Nand lala, Radha kyun gori, main kyun kala'. Also when we read snow white and the line 'Who is the fairest one of all' gave us a mental image of fair is beautiful. But before India was invaded by fair-skinned people, the country ws already fascinated by the lighter color of skin. In Sanskrit, the term 'Asuryasparsh' is used to define he who is untanned, untouched by the sun's heat and is therefore pure and affluent.

The first 'White Cream' in India

Royal Indian women, fascinated by white skin, used to apply pearl extracts on their skin for enhanced fairness. In 1919, India got its first commercial fairness cream in Afghan Snow, manufactured by ES Patanwala, a perfumer/entrepreneur who came to Mumbai from a small principality (Jhalra Patan) in Rajasthan. The cream was named after King Zahir of Afghanistan, who felt that it reminded him of the snow from his homeland.

Why should Girls have all the 'Fairness'?

Men who were secretly applying women's fairness creams formed 30% of the total users. That they needed a fairness cream that suited their skin was an insight Emami was the first to leverage on. It launched Fair & Handsome in 2005. Others followed suit but to date, they remain the strongest in the men's fairness creams market. The USP of each of these brands is the celebrity that endorses the product.

 Courtsey: Fair And Handsome

Celebrities who refused to endorse fairness products

Kangana Ranaut, Ranbir Kapoor, Kalki Koechlin, Abhay Deol, Anushka Sharma are few Bollywood superstars who decided to step up against the racial slur and refused endorsements of fairness products.