Boy Killed In Unilever's 'Clear Men' Reality Show

Was it an act of negligence or was it a case of ’squeezing the producers’ which resulted in this catastrophe? It has been confirmed that recently a participant in the ‘Clear Men’ Reality Show by the name of Saad Khan lost his life in the recording of the show when the host Amina Sheikh (the model of Clear Shampoo) gave an under water challenge to him. The boy lost his control and shouted for help but the lame safety and lifeline measures failed to rescue him up and the young man, the father of four had to suffer.

The production was being done by Naved Arshad, the owner of Oxygene Channel.

Aarpix has more on the story at http://www.aarpix.com/mag/2009/08/22/breaking-news-unilever-pakistan-kills-a-young-boy-in-their-lame-stunt-tv-show.html.

The response however is what prompted me to write this post. Spokespersons of these two companies have been shamelessly calling the incident a mere accident and not accepting responsibility for such a loss. It is one thing to drive the production budgets down to a point where even the safety equipment is not of standard anymore. However it’s another more shocking aspect that these big multinationals are decrying the incident and our local media is helping them.

I do hope Unilever has formulated a proper response for this tragedy. Being the largest advertiser in Pakistan does not mean that a company can shun its responsibilities to the people.