Despite the fact that India has made rapid progress on various fronts, open discussions about sex and its related subjects, like sexually transmitted diseases and usage of condoms are not encouraged. However, considering the fact that India has among the highest number of persons living with HIV/AIDS in the world today there is a need to educate the people about this dreaded disease and how it can be prevented.

Social marketing encompasses the set of marketing activities aimed at achieving a social objective for the society's well-being. Since the HIV/AIDS epidemic has spread to a large extent in India, there is a greater need for increased social marketing efforts to prevent the further growth of this disease. Social marketing of condoms is an important task for the government and NGOs working for HIV/AIDS prevention in India. Condom usage has been heavily promoted through many innovative social advertising campaigns. Some of the innovative social advertising campaigns promoting usage of condoms for HIV/AIDS prevention in India are discussed below.

The `Balbir Pasha' series of mass media campaigns were a big success in spreading awareness about HIV/ AIDS prevention in India. These campaigns were promoted by Population Services International (PSI) under a project named `Operation Lighthouse'. PSI is a Washington-based non-profit NGO which is working across 60 countries in the world. These series of campaigns were rolled out by PSI for five years in 12 major port areas throughout India. The advertising agency, Lowe, was also involved in this campaign.

In this phase, Mumbai city was selected for outdoor campaigning. hoardings, FM radio and television were used for this purpose. Many teaser ads were initially released in outdoor and print media with the tag line - Balbir Pasha Ko AIDS Hoga Kya? meaning "Will Balbir Pasha get AIDS?" These series of teaser campaigns created a lot of curiosity and attracted public attention and immediately reached a wide audience.

Advertising Express Magazine, Social Marketing, advertising campaigns, Population Services International, PSI, BBC World Service Trust, National AIDS Control Organization, NACO, National AIDS Control Program, NACP, Voluntary Organizations, Celebrity Endorsements, United States Agency for International Development, USAID.