Fish & Fevikwik: Why this iconic ad is still stuck in our heads

One fine Saturday, ad film director Prasoon Pandey sauntered into the Ogilvy office.

As Prasoon began to brainstorm with the team to crack a suitable idea for Pidilite’s Fevikwik, that is when Ogilvy’s National Creative Director Piyush Pandey, who also happens to be his brother, walked in and asked the gang to join for a beer.

But the team refused as the brainstorming was important. That’s when Piyush stated, “Fevikwik ka kya hai? Somebody puts it on a stick, puts it inside the water, and catches fish.”

The entire team’s jaws dropped, reminisced Prasoon. This was in 1999.

Chutki mein chipkaye

Pidilite Industries has been one of the long standing clients of Ogilvy India and an assignment to conceptualise a commercial had come their way for the brand Fevikwik. And, Madhukar Balvantray Parekh, who is the chairman of the Indian adhesives manufacturing company, was the client.

Once the idea was cracked, it was time to present it to the client.

Before presenting, Piyush called his team to fetch him a glass of water, a pencil, and a one rupee coin. He put a drop of Fevikwik on the pencil and stuck the coin. Then he immersed it in the glass of water, and pulled it out.

The coin was safely stuck to the pencil.

Asked why he did this, the veteran adman explained that it was to prove the point that Fevikwik does not wear off even when immersed in water.

When the time came to convert the idea into a film, Prasoon suggested the storyline of an affluent fisherman and a modest villager who go to the river to fish.

According to Prasoon, Kamal Chopra, who starred in Ericsson’s Cannes Lion-winning commercial ‘One black coffee, please’ was roped in to play the affluent fisherman as he had a suave and sophisticated look. On the other hand, Rajesh Khera was brought on board to play the simple villager.

In a conversation with Storyboard18, Khera reminisced that many had auditioned to play the role of the modest villager. But, one fine day, he got a call that he was selected.

The story flowed like this. A suave fisherman is at the river bank and is feeling frustrated because he’s unable to catch a single fish. But along comes an excited villager, which irritates the man. This simple villager puts four dots of Fevikwik on a stick, immerses it in the river, and lo! Four fishes get stuck to the stick.

Prasoon explained that the idea was for the simple villager to succeed where the affluent one failed, as most people want the underdog to win.

Because his wife had asked for four fishes, the simple villager, evidently a Tamilian in the film, counted in his mother tongue, ‘Onnu (one), renda (two), moonu (three), naalu (four) …’ while putting dots of Fevikwik on the stick. The voice over for Khera was done by voice-over artiste Chetan Shashital, revealed the actor.

Piyush stated that apart from the fisherman counting in Tamil, there were no other words in the TVC. Hence, no dubbing was required.

The tagline ‘Chutki mein chipkaaye, Fevikwik,’ was coined by Piyush. The ad was shot at a lake in Karjat. Released pan-India on television in 1999, the commercial met with critical and popular acclaim.

Fun fact and success

Khera revealed a fun fact. Once a fish is removed from the water, it would thrash about and attaching it to the stick would be impossible. Hence, dead fish were attached to the stick. Khera was told that they would be animated during post-production. But he was also instructed to move his hand in such a way to make it look as if the fish are thrashing about. The shot went well and there was no need to work on the movement of the fish during post-production.

In the year 2000, as Piyush stated, the Fevikwik ad was adjudged as the ‘TV commercial of the century.’

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