e is a stranger in northern India, but Mumbai knows him as Balbir Pasha, while Chennai and Hyderabad know him as Pulli Raja. He is the fictitious character created three years ago by Lowe for its client Population Services International (PSI). He is the protagonist in PSI�s AIDS awareness communication, which addresses heterosexual men, and he is back in the mass media for the second phase of the campaign after a successful run in 2002.
At the core of the campaign is the insight that people can learn by observing the behaviour of others (the Social Learning Theory of Albert Bandura). And the two phases of the Balbir Pasha campaign addressed the issue in two different ways.
Through a mixture of strategically placed outdoor communications, hard-hitting television and radio messaging, and comprehensive newspaper exposure, the character of Balbir Pasha was portrayed in the first phase in various intriguing scenarios. He served as a behavioural model for consumers of mass media to learn from and empathise with. Priti Nair Chakravarthy, group creative director, Lowe, says, "The communication has never asked anyone to change their behaviour, but simply given an example of careless behaviour and its consequences." She adds, "And never in the campaign have we said that Balbir Pasha gets AIDS. It just plugs the line - "Balbir Pasha ko AIDS hoga kya?"... more