MxMIndia

Tag: TOI

  • Hence I shall do my evaluation purely on the presumption that most readers were able to smell it. If that is the case, it's a kick-ass innovation and needs to be applauded

    Debrief: Didn’t smell the coffee (but loved the innovation)!

    By Anil Thakraney

     

    So, after ‘singing’ newspapers, we have smelly newspapers. (God knows what awaits us next… perhaps farting newspapers.) Last Sunday, makers of Bru Gold executed a sensational media innovation in the TOI. The cover page was made to smell of coffee beans. So that readers could experience the fragrance of Bru Gold.

     

    To be very honest, I had no idea and only heard about this innovation from reports in the media. Because when I lifted that particular edition, which was soon after the municipal elections in Mumbai, I could only smell rats inside the newspaper, if you know what I mean. But I did not smell the coffee. To give the advertiser the benefit of the doubt here, I must declare that I don’t drink coffee, so maybe that’s why the aroma eluded me.

     

    Therefore I shall do my evaluation purely on the presumption that most readers were able to smell it. If that is the case, it’s a kick-ass innovation and needs to be applauded. Must have taken a lot of preparation and perseverance to make it happen, and one must appreciate that. I also approve of the innovation because unlike Volkswagen’s musical newspaper (a really corny idea) this one was non-intrusive and silent. So, good work guys, and I will be generous with my rating.

     

    However, that still doesn’t change the fact that I only smelled rats in the newspaper that morning.

     

    Rating: (On a scale of 1 to 5): 4. Super media innovation. Should win a few trophies.

     

  • Stung by jibes that it is boring, The Hindu has hit back at what it terms "the news equivalent of junk food"

    Hindu hits back with a tough punch

     

    By Tuhina Anand

     

    The Times of India fired the first salvo with its hints at a “boring” newspaper. The Hindu has countered with its ‘Stay ahead of the times’ campaign. A bit of a revelation coming from the house of the newspaper which is perceived as traditional and old-fashioned, the 360-degree pan-Indian advertising campaign seeks to bring the core values of journalism to the fore. At the same time it shows how the ‘popular’ read has trivialised the kind of news being dished out to the readers, with the result that they are more clued in about Aishwarya’s baby and Hrithik Roshan’s pet name than knowing the name of the Vice President of India.

     

    What is more surprising is that in the campaign, even though it’s bleeped out, one knows that people who have been featured say that they read The Times of India, thus clearly acknowledging at one go that TOI is a force to reckon with but at the same time responsible for this trivialization of news. The tagline leaves no room for doubt as it states, “Stay ahead of the times.”

     

    This kind of aggressive marketing could be the answer to the campaign that The Times of India had come out with a few months ago in the Tamil Nadu market which targeted The Hindu for being boring. The Times of India campaign says, “Stuck with the news that puts you to sleep? Wake up to The Times of India.” In fact, it is learnt that the TOI had even printed a dummy newspaper, circulated within the industry, with The Hindu masthead and “zzzzz” printed all over, to underline its message that reading the newspaper put people to sleep.

     

    Mr Suresh Srinivasan, Vice President (Advt), The Hindu Group of Publications insists that the campaign is not a reaction to the earlier TOI salvo. He said, “We have been on a path of transformation and change where we have not only undergone organizational changes but also been contemporising our product in order to connect better with our reader. The changes have been in content, layout and packaging based on the research we had commissioned, and their suggestions.”

     

    He added, “We are the country’s most respected English daily and the number 1 English daily in the South, with a growing footprint in the North. While we build on our strengths there is also a need to protect our turf. The Times of India is definitely our single largest competitor down South.”

     

    The Times of India, meanwhile, has been watching the recent development with a  touch of amusement. Mr Rahul Kansal, Chief Marketing Officer at Bennett Coleman & Company Limited, said: “It is good fun to watch it from the sidelines. TOI is an all-India brand and has redefined the news and newspapers altogether. In fact, this doesn’t really damage our brand in any way. On the contrary, it reiterates the fact that we are a very strong contender for the leadership position in the Chennai market. Remember, the Coke and Pepsi war? It didn’t hamper Coke in any way but it did establish Pepsi as a worthy young brand.”

     

    One of The Hindu TVCs
    [youtube width=”400″ height=”200″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmXPBp7DpQw[/youtube]
    The Times of India TVC
    http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/videos/news/Wake-up-Chennai/videoshow/10557020.cms

    “While advertising, one does exaggerate and that’s what we had done when we said in our earlier campaign that The Hindu is a staid brand. One takes extreme positions in advertising to bring out the humour, so even now when the ad says we give only Page 3 news that just to bring out humour. Everybody knows that the TOI is a complete newspaper,” added Mr Kansal.

     

    Despite the impressive numbers of The Hindu, there definitely seems some concern about the might of the TOI which led to this kind of aggressive marketing. Mr Narendra Kumar Alambara, Vice President at Starcom Worldwide, who has been observing the Chennai market, explained: “The TOI has made inroads into the Chennai English newspaper market and there is no denying that. While the gap between the leader and TOI is still huge, but the latter has become a strong competitor. Youngsters and migrant population have been picking up this newspaper, especially, because of the kind of news reporting that TOI has been doing. While earlier there was no option, but now there is an alternative read. In terms of readership, I think that for The Hindu it has remained stagnant while TOI has grown the category itself. However, one should remember that in the Chennai market retail advertisers lead and for them The Hindu is still a priority.”

     

    On the campaign, Mr Srinivasan said: “The Hindu believes that, more than ever in a globalising, knowledge-driven economy, it is vital that readers are well-informed about the world at large. And yet, over the last few years, the news and media industry in India has become increasingly focused on serving up a steady diet of trivia, shying away from the national and international issues that really matter. This may help sell more newspapers or get more viewership in the short term, but it is the news equivalent of junk food. And the long-term result is a steady dumbing-down of readers who end up knowing more about Aishwarya’s baby than the Arab Spring.”

     

    The campaign shows how one may be creating a country that is fully conversant with gossip and Page 3 culture but clueless about current affairs and world events.

     

    Mr Srinivasan says, “The campaign is aimed at triggering conversation and if we succeed in provoking thought and debate that would be the measure of our success. It is intended as an eye-opener to get people to re-evaluate their media choices, to demand a smarter newspaper.”

     

    The campaign will be on TV, radio, cinema, print, outdoor and digital. It will be supported by on-ground activities in malls, cafes and other locations.

     

  • The Bennett Coleman president answers Anil Thakraney's searching questions on his long career with the TOI & the group's ideologies & practices

    I don’t read rival newspapers: Bhaskar Das

     

    By Anil Thakraney

     

    I have met Bhaskar Das on and off. (I once even secretly freelanced for him in my advertising days.) During my stint with Mumbai Mirror, I got to know him a little better. He has always come across as a cool, calculating and sharp business manager… but someone who’s smart enough not to build his own image over that of his company. In a long conversation inside his plush corner office (previously occupied by Pradeep Guha), Bennett Coleman’s president answers searching questions on his long career with the Times, the group’s ideologies and sometimes controversial practices.

     

    The one new thing I discovered about Bhaskar during this discussion is that he’s a deeply spiritual person, and often, as he himself said to me, uses learnings from The Gita to ‘sanitise’ his various marketing strategies. Wonder what Lord Krishna would have to say on Media Net.

     

    But I must say the man who heads the nation’s largest newspaper house retained his composure even when facing tough queries. Spirituality at work, I suppose.

     

    Boss, when do you retire? You are 58.

    See, retirement has two different connotations. For me, it’s ‘Retyrement’. Like re-treading tyres. And that means adding new capabilities. Coming specifically to Bennett, I have a flexible retirement plan. As per the company’s desire, I should stay as long as I am mentally, physically and intellectually fit. But I must add that I live by the day. So I am only bothered about the now.

     

    You’ve been with the company for 32 years. Never got bored of the same place?

    Boredom only happens when you don’t love your job. I have continuously rediscovered and redefined my space, so the journey has always been very exploratory. I don’t know whether the excitement would have been there if I had worked in a bank or in some other financial company. Newspaper is a 360 day product. Because of my personal liking for content, I have always been involved in it in some form or the other. Honestly, for me, 32 years feels like 32 days.

     

    The flip side is some people would say Bhaskar is risk averse.

    It’s not the question of being risk averse. By that logic if you continue in a marriage you are risk averse! I don’t believe in changing jobs for the heck of it. People use it as a spring board for becoming financially more solvent, and that has never occurred to me. For me, a job is a gateway to learning and it’s not for pay slips. Also, even if I have worked in the same company, I have done multiple roles in multiple markets. Our shareholders have always been great teachers. So, I have updated myself continuously, and I can challenge anyone in terms of my cognitive bandwidth on various industries.

     

    Your biggest achievement in all these years?

    I am proud of having been a part of the company when it re-invented itself. The process started post-1985, when our Vice Chairman took over the reigns of the company and subsequently the Managing Director. And finally, in the last six years, I have been able to drive the ambitions of the company to such great lengths, that today the company is the biggest media house in terms of both, turnover and profitability.

     

    Bhaskar, the real challenge lies in turning around failed, small brands. Anyone can build on success.

    That’s the classical model. For me, taking a giant brand and making it bigger and taking it to a different level also requires equal guts. And even for a loss making brand, we have done that. Mumbai Mirror, when we started, was making losses.

     

    Today it is a Rs200 crore brand. This has become possible over a period of six years. And I have to add that I have taken many risks, in terms of launching new brands and making them successful. A number of big groups have also folded up, they screwed up. Success is its biggest enemy. When you are No 1, there’s only place for one person. To stay there requires more energy than reaching there.

     

    How many years do you give newspapers to survive in India?

    I am very optimistic about news per se. Today, we are leveraging the core and also investing in the embryonic and the emerging media, in terms of a news channel, websites, and so on. We are seeing ourselves as a complementary option as opposed to a substitutive option. Point is, TOI of 1830 and TOI of 1990 and TOI of 2020 will be a very different paper. We are constantly re-inventing to develop the complementary utility of the brand. We have become very futuristic, we are creating more and more niches. As for the newspaper itself, it is a matter of conjecture. I think in the Indian context, there’s a peculiarity, which is that English language is a big deal. Let me explain. To think of India as one nation is a mistake. There is a developing India, there is a developed India and there is an under-developed India. The developed India’s behaviour is more or less like the West, so there might be some erosion of the newspaper in this segment as they shift to Iphones and Ipads. But for the other two Indias, newspapers will continue to prosper for some time. For them, English is a gateway to career and growth.

     

    Coming back to your question, I am not an astrologer, but I do agree with the gentleman who said that in 2040, the last copy of a newspaper will get printed.

    Having said that, I do not suffer from format myopia, because that would kill a corporation. I think of news as a genre, not as a format.

     

    There’s been some buzz of an IPO from your group. True?

    This can always be on the agenda of any corporation, including ours. But as of now, nothing has been decided. I am not saying it will never happen, but not in the near future.

     

    Do you admit that competition has been good for the TOI as a newspaper? Pre HT and DNA, the TOI in Mumbai had lost its edit focus. Now, the news coverage is remarkably superior.

    I have always believed competition is good. Obviously, one has to respond, not react. If, while responding, the quality of the product improves, then that’s damn good. But it’s a part of the re-invention process. In Calcutta, we are the dominant force now. Or for that matter in Bangalore and Delhi, where we became the competition. But not all market leaders have responded positively. We are a dynamic group; it’s in our genetic core to re-invent.

     

    What are the innovations Bhaskar Das has masterminded in the last five years?

    I have not, it’s all a team effort. ‘I’ as a word does not exist in my dictionary. In our group we all work as a team. No individual is bigger than the team.

     

    Private treaties, for which your group has been both, admired and dissed… it hasn’t eventually paid off, right?

    It’s thriving; it’s a part of our deep strategy. We didn’t want to make money on these.

     

    Whoa, the whole idea is to do a space and equity barter for revenue. And to encash on the acquired equity.

    If we wanted to encash on the equity we would have gone to the stock market. Our strategic intent has not been understood, and we want it to remain not understood. It’s a demand-side innovation, and nothing else. Private treaties are now called Brand Capital out here, we have re-invented it and it’s doing extremely well.

     

    Is Pradeep Guha your mentor?

    I have had many mentors in my life, and he is one of them. He has been a great teacher for me.

     

    Some years ago, in this very room, Guha said to me that for the group, the target audience is the advertiser. Do you agree with this ideology?

    This kind of question cannot be answered with ‘one size fits all’ sort of a thing.

    We have two customers: Readers and advertisers. Agreed, that our business model is so skewed that we are dependent on advertisers, but we have never forgotten that the reader is the franchise that leads to advertising revenue. The point is to get ad relevant audience… which means people who are culturally and financially solvent enough to engage with the advertisers. But for getting that also you need interesting content. So it’s both, Lakshmi and Saraswati.

     

    In 2004, you were about to buy Mid Day. What went wrong?

    Nothing went wrong. We wanted to buy and even Mid Day wanted to sell, but in any such deal both the partners have to have a buy-in on terms and conditions. That didn’t happen.

     

    Regret losing out on Mid Day?

    Now that Mirror has come, Mid Day is not required.

     

    It’s generally believed Reponse calls all the shots in your group. True?

    There’s no truth in this. I worked in Response for 30 years, and I have never seen any semblance of power. Only thing is, because of the business model, which is that advertising gives us 90 percent of our revenues, it’s perceived to be the most powerful. Every division plays its part. We have no say in the content. If that had been the case, the TOI wouldn’t face the maximum ban from clients (amongst newspapers). We have the Chinese wall, though we do Brand Capital. The editorial is completely independent.

     

    Cross your heart and tell me. You have never gone to one of your editors to ask him or her to plug an advertiser?

    I have never done it.

     

    That’s very hard to believe.

    Trust me. I cross my heart. When clients approach us, we ask them to approach the editorial director. Because it will never work if it goes through us.

     

    Funny that happens in a media company that runs Media Net.

    That’s because people haven’t understood Media Net. Others do it secretly, we are very clear we do it only for the entertainment publications, and with clearly defined protocols. Others do it as legitimate coverage.

     

    Truth is, Media Net sowed the seeds of paid journalism in this country.

    I don’t think so. There have been enough examples in the past, where, for financial and public issue ads, journalists always got a bad name. I would say it is much more transparent and protocolised out here.

     

    Are you proud of MediaNet?

    (Slight hesitation.) See, it’s not the question of being proud of it. Life is not black and white. It’s a part of the strategic process we have done. I feel what used to happen previously was more unethical, where, if you knew a journalist, you could get a plug. And we have openly announced these are promotional supplements.

     

    You’ve kept a very low profile. Looks like you don’t want to repeat Guha’s mistake.

    (Smiles widely) No individual can be like another person. I can’t be what I am not. I don’t think Mr Guha was high-profile; the job is such that you get noticed. Now, maybe there’s nothing noticeable in me! I always say that ultimately it’s the corporation that gives you the halo. And I have no personal halo.

     

    I think you have decided to be clever about it.

    That’s your conclusion. I did exactly what I believed in. That my work is to serve the company, which I do.

     

    An Indian editor you admire. Someone not from your group.

    Unfortunately, I can’t comment because I have not worked with them. Also, I don’t read competitive products.

     

    You don’t read rival newspapers?

    I don’t.

     

    Don’t you want to know what the competition is doing?

    For that my MIS reports are there. My brand team is keeping an eye on the competition, I don’t have to do it. I don’t have the time to read everything, it’s better to read a few publications in-depth.

     

    Vir Sanghvi said to me that even if it was the last job in the world, he would still not work at the TOI.

    It’s a democratic country, we respect individual opinion. These things don’t affect me at all. I am a spiritual person.

     

    When did you become spiritual?

    I have always been spiritual, it’s a journey. We are all expressions of god. And so you must love everyone and not be judgmental of others. When you are spiritual, you love everyone.

     

    I think the Jain family’s spiritual beliefs have rubbed off on you.

    It would have happened anyway, even if I had worked in any other corporation.

     

    Photograph: Fotocorp

     

  • In Freaking News, Ranjona Banerji reviews the fare on primetime news and the morning papers

    Much admiration for glam add-ons

    By Ranjona Banerji

     

    Just to entertain myself, I decide to read the glamour supplements of The Times of India and Hindustan Times. Though now I am not sure whether entertainment or aggravation is what I was looking for. Since the arrival of Medianet and its variations in other newspapers, I usually ignore Bombay Times, HT Cafe and the entertainment/celebrity sections of all newspapers. Disclosure: I used to write a restaurant review for DNA After.Hrs but I haven’t seen that either for over a year and many years ago, I edited the Ahmedabad Times and Baroda Times. This takes nothing away from my life as I have minimal interest in Bollywood and tinpot celebs.

     

    So what have I learnt today? That a supermodel I had never heard of (though they told us her name) has agreed to launch a perfume (which was not named). This unnamed perfume will cost a million dollars and proceeds from sales will go to charity (named). So what do I make of this? That the supermodel paid Bombay Times, while the perfume and charity did not? Or that the editors just take the line of least resistance and do not name whoever had paying potential?

     

    This then turned into a fun game. Ekta Kapoor made an appearance (some new movie or something) on the front pages of both Bombay Times and HT Cafe. Money paid or not? Time Out has its food awards this week. HT Cafe covered it, Bombay Times did not. Because Bombay Times has its own awards or… By the way, these are the people whose pictures appeared in HT Cafe as guests or presenters at the Time Out awards: Abhay Deol, Malaika Arora Khan, Neha Dhupia, Shahana Goswami, Mahie Gill, Kalki Koechlin and Shruti Shah. Barring Deol and Dhupia (though it could be her large dress), none of the others looked like they’d eaten a meal in two weeks. Two winning chefs got a mention in the accompanying paragraph and no restaurants were mentioned (paid or not…?).

     

    A story on French producer (called veteran, which means just about anything) Marc Zermati is headlined ‘I’m not interested in Bollywood bulls**t’ is next to the Time Out story which perhaps shows someone in HT Cafe has a great sense of irony or none at all.

     

    Both Bombay Times and HT Cafe have the same people in the lead: Priyanka Chopra and Hrithik Roshan. Bombay Times says they both get ‘wet and naughty’. (Actually the headline says ‘Hrithik and PC get wet and naughty’ so for a moment I thought it had something to do with Hrithik and computer porn. The pic showed them really close, so give me a break). HT Cafe has Priyanka Chopra saying there is no “lip-lock” in this movie. So don’t get disappointed when you watch it, presumably.

     

    I was pleased to see that I no longer needed a magnifying glass to read my fortune in Bombay Times but was disappointed to see that it did not say reading “advertorial entertainment promotional features is bad for mental health”.

     

    Anyway, by this time I was so bored that I had to stop.

     

    Question for those who make them and those who read them: how do you guys do it? Full admiration!

  • The Times of India Group launched TWeek, first of its kind digital magazine at the INMA platform.

    TOI launches TWeek at INMA

    By Tuhina Anand

     

    The Times of India Group launched TWeek, first of its kind digital magazine at the INMA platform. The weekly will be released every Friday and can be accessed from iPhone, iPad or any Android tablet device.

     

    Elaborating on the product, Rishi Khiani, CEO, Times Internet Ltd, said, “The idea to launch this came seven days ago and digital provides the platform where content can be put together at such a short time. TWeek is largely sourced from content that is available on our blog verticals that we put together. Its content that has long shelf life and brings out the flavor of a week.”

     

    He added, “Its content that is repackaged in a format that works on iphone, ipad and whatever other android tablet devices available. It allows interactivity associated with the medium but at the same time is low on cost of production.”

     

    Mr Khiani calls TWeek the first digital magazine that doesn’t have print counterpart in India. However, he did add that the print version of the magazine could be planned in future. The magazine will cater to the youth. Apart from content that is available in form of blogs, it will also have original content like its cover story to attract more consumers to access it.

     

  • The Times of India and The Cardiological Society of India are organizing an India Heart Conclave to engage relevant stakeholders from the healthcare fraternity in a discussion on necessary actions for managing cardiological disorders.

    TOI holds ‘heart conclave’

    By A Correspondent

    The Times of India and The Cardiological Society of India are organizing an India Heart Conclave to engage relevant stakeholders from the healthcare fraternity in a discussion on necessary actions for managing cardiological disorders.

     

    India is undergoing a transition and is on the threshold of an epidemic of cardiovascular disease. It ranks extremely high amongst the nations struck by the rising wave of premature deaths caused by non-communicable diseases, mainly heart and blood ailments. The country of 1 billion plus was estimated to account for 60 percent of the world’s heart disease cases in 2010. And a recent study found that people in India and other South Asian countries suffer their first heart attack at age 53, on average – six years earlier than the rest of the world.

     

    India Heart Conclave, a daylong conclave is being held on October 20, 2011, 2 pm onwards at The Oberoi Hotel, New Delhi.

  • Mediaah! tries to find out which of the news channel stars fit the Times of India descriptor of over-the-top anchors

    Mediaah!: Is Arnab Goswami the “over-the-top anchor” in the TOI ad?

    By Pradyuman Maheshwari

     

    This is not the first time that someone from within the Bennett, Coleman & Co empire has taken on Arnab Goswami and Times Now. In the past, Prashant Panday went hammer and tongs at Arnab. The post was on Prashant’s Facebook wall, and didn’t beat about the bush. I must say I was quite surprised that the CEO of a group company which runs the very popular Radio Mirchi network could write all of it so openly (read: An open letter to Arnab ).

    The fact that Prashant wrote it and still has his job speaks volumes for the internal democracy that exists in the group. Though my wicked brain thinks there’s more to it… especially when I saw this ad on the sports pages of the Mumbai edition. Chhota 15×3 ad, but very interesting.

    You must read the text… all of it.

     

    Heated discussions. Accusations and counter accusations. Provocative soundbytes. Panelists competing to outshout each other. Inflammatory visuals. Over-the-top anchors. That’s the stuff TV news is made of. But while it may stir your emotions, does it really leave you better informed about the subject being discussed? Probably not.

    That’s where the print media comes in. Since we don’t labour under the tyranny of having to fill in news 24 hours a day, we can afford to be choosy about what we publish. Beyond the sound and fury of TV’s breaking news, we provide balance, perspective and sober discourse.

    And nobody does it better that The Times of India, the world’s leading English newspaper.We give our readers accurate and balanced news, along with insightful analysis. And we ensure that all points of view are covered. So after you’ve been stirred and shaken by TV news at night, wake up to a bright new day. And get informed by The Times of India.

     

     

     

     

     

     

    Not all of it is untrue. Panelists do outshout each other on news TV. Put Jayanthi Natarajan and Ravi Shankar Prasad in one discussion and there’s more noise and less discussion. Also you can be sure you won’t find all the news on television… esp the private channels. Doordarshan News has a lot more meat, but it is soooo boring.

    What deserves another look and no real reading between the lines is a bit from the first para:

    Heated discussions. Accusations and counter accusations. Provocative soundbytes. Panelists competing to outshout each other. Inflammatory visuals. Over-the-top anchors. That’s the stuff TV news is made of.

    So let’s look at the people who dominate the nightly news on the English non-business news channels, which I guess is what the TOI ad is talking about: Rahul Kanwal (Headlines Today), Rajdeep Sardesai and Sagarika Ghose (CNN-IBN), Vikram Chandra, Barkha Dutt, Prannoy Roy (NDTV 24×7) and of course Arnab Goswami on Times Now. There’s also Rahul Shivshankar on NewsX, but my cable operator doesn’t offer the channel, so would reserve comment on him.

    Rahul Kanwal is aggressive and provocative, but he is not sound and fury. Rajdeep has mellowed (and become very good once again), but Sagarika can go high-pitched. On NDTV, Dr Roy and Vikram C are exceedingly softspoken and can’t harm a fly. Barkha still attempts to ask some tough questions, but like Rajdeep isn’t what she used to be around the time of the Gujarat riots.

    The one man who fits most of the attributes described in the Times (of India) ad is Arnab Goswami. I don’t agree with him being over-the-top, though there are many who believe so. I think he asks the tough questions, and is possibly the only one to do so day after day. Yes, he gets carried away, but needs to be cruel with our politicians. And even as I join others in lampooning Arnab for his the-nation-wants-to-know-line, the fact of the matter is that we all really want to know.

    I do feel that Times Now overstretches itself on issues like Pakistan, China or racism, but heck we need it.  As for inflammatory visuals, I think the print media is also fairly irresponsible. Though the impact of television is a lot, lot more on the common man or woman.

    Let’s keep this discussion on. Email Mediaah! at pradyumanm@mxmindia.com and I will carry the best comment here when I am back on Tuesday.

     

     

    Pataudi, RIP

     

    But for the time when he patted me on the back and gave me an autograph, I’ve never met him. But heard loads about him.

    When the news of Tiger Pataudi’s passing came in last night, almost by reflex I called a colleague to check if we could get someone in adland to reminisce dealings with him for endorsements. Then we tried checking on his connections as editor of Sportsworld and for his stint at Dev Features. The Sportsworld team is scattered all over. There’s an interesting tribute by Derek O’Brien in The Telegraph.

    I called Vivek Sengupta on reading his tweet, and finally convinced him to write a few lines. That was around midnight. Vivek may have turned into a public affairs and PR practitioner for a while, but he’s essentially a journo. He knew I wanted him to write, and sent his copy in an hour.

    Meanwhile, we had no luck with getting an adman to write on Pataudi’s ads. But here are two of his TVC that I found on YouTube (the  first a rather long Gwalior Suitings ad and the other being the recent Lays TVC with Saif)

    [youtube width=”350″ height=”260″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iei989o4l-I[/youtube]

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    [youtube width=”350″ height=”260″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTVIrhnt5x4[/youtube]

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    Buzz me if you have a story to tell. Confidentiality assured. There are various ways you can reach me:

    pradyumanm[at]mxmindia.com, 23050B5D, pradyumanm@gmail.com, @pmahesh, 98338 76278.