MAM
Brand Curry hires Dhirendra Agrawal as creative head
MUMBAI: Creative agency Brand Curry has appointed Dhirendra Agrawal as creative head. He will report to Brand Curry managing director Subrata Chakraborty.
Agrawal’s previous stint was with Avon Beauty Products. Agrawal’s duties at Brand Curry include restructuring the organisation, bringing dynamism into the system and making the agency ready for the next level of growth.
Agrawal has 14 years of experience and has worked with brands like TVS, Kwality Walls, Levi‘s, Dockers, ITC Food, Bagpiper, ING Vysya, Airtel, AMD, Himalaya, Times of India, Canon and Honda Bikes. He started his career as a visualiser with Cognito Advertising in 1998. Seven months later, he joined Pinnacle Advertising in the same position. In 1999, Agrawal moved to McCann Erickson as art director. In 2004, he joined Rediffusion-Y&R as creative group head. He then moved to Contract Advertising as associate creative director a couple of years later.
Before joining Avon Beauty Products as creative head, Agrawal served at Denstu Marcom for four months.
Brands
Uidai partners with Google to help users locate Aadhaar centres
Verified Aadhaar centres to appear on Maps with services and access info
MUMBAI: Finding an Aadhaar centre may soon be as easy as finding your favourite café. In a move aimed at making public services more accessible, the Unique Identification Authority of India has partnered with Google to display authorised Aadhaar centres on Google Maps. The feature, expected to roll out in the coming months, will allow residents to locate verified centres quickly and confidently.
More than 60,000 Aadhaar centres, including state of the art Aadhaar Seva Kendras, will be mapped. When users search on Google Maps, they will be directed to authorised facilities rather than unverified listings, helping curb misinformation and confusion.
The listings will do more than drop a pin. Users will be able to see the nature of services offered at each centre, whether it is adult enrolment, child enrolment, or limited to address and mobile number updates. Details such as operating hours, parking availability and divyang friendly infrastructure will also be shown wherever applicable.
Uidai CEO Bhuvnesh Kumar, said the collaboration is part of the authority’s continued effort to improve ease of living for Aadhaar holders by making authorised centres simpler and faster to navigate.
The partnership will deepen in its next phase, with Uidai using Google Business Profile to manage information and respond directly to public feedback. Looking ahead, the two organisations are also exploring the option of enabling appointment bookings through the Google Maps interface, potentially allowing residents to plan their visits with greater efficiency.
Google India country head, strategic partnerships Roli Agarwal, said integrating verified Aadhaar centres would help millions access trusted services with confidence, bringing essential government infrastructure closer to the people who need it most.
If all goes to plan, a routine Aadhaar update may soon begin not with a queue, but with a search bar.
