Emami, the maker of Fair and Handsome, a brand endorsed by Shahrukh Khan, had already changed the name of its brand to ‘Emami Glow & Handsome’ and launched the brand digitally last week. 

Emami has threatened legal action against HUL in an exchange filing on Thursday. In a statement, Emami said:

Although shocked, we are not surprised to note HUL’s unfair business practice, which has been prevalent time & again to damage our brand image.

But whose name is it anyway? Here’s a history of both the brands.  

HUL, a subsidiary of British-Dutch multinational company Unilever PLC, has been selling Fair & Lovely since the 70s and largely serviced the female audience. Fair & Lovely accounts for 40% of the face care category in India. 

After seeing a growing demand for fairness cream among men, Emami launched Fair & Handsome in 2005. The same cream that is endorsed by Shahrukh Khan.  

HUL entered the men’s personal care market in 2006 with Fair & Lovely For Men. This isn’t the first time both the companies have been at loggerheads through their ad campaigns.  

HUL had filed a petition against Emami for damaging ad commercials against their Fair & Lovely Cream (for women). In a 2018 injunction order against HUL, Emami sought to restrain HUL from publishing a TV commercial for their Fair and Lovely Men’s brand.  

Several cosmetic brands, including HUL & Emami, have been under the scanner for their products that promote skin fairness. It further intensified during the ‘Black Lives Matter’ protests in the west.   

More and more companies are either changing their brand names or halting the sale of the products that promote skin fairness to stereotyping racial types.  

Recently, Johnson & Johnson has stopped the sale of its skin whitening cream and French brand L’Oreal Group also announced that it will drop words such as ‘white/whitening, fair/fairness, light/lightning’ from all its skincare products.