New Delhi, May 26 -- New Delhi: The government has quietly put on the back burner its plan to tighten norms on surrogate advertising, as the department of consumer affairs struggles to craft a watertight, legally sustainable definition to curb the practice, said two people aware of the matter.

The lack of a precise definition for surrogate advertising could leave regulators open to possible legal challenges from the country's largest liquor firms, including the Indian arms of Pernod Ricard and Diageo, apart from United Breweries, Carlsberg India and Radico Khaitan, they said, requesting not be named. An overly broad rule risks being struck down, potentially legitimising the very practices it seeks to curb.

For now, such advertisements w...