MAM
Joy Mohanty joins Dentsu Creative India as chief creative officer
Mumbai: Dentsu Creative India has announced the appointment of Joy Mohanty as its chief creative officer. He will report to the company’s group chief creative officer, Ajay Gahlaut.
Joy will be instrumental in accelerating Dentsu Creative India’s growth trajectory in the North region. He will align with the agency’s ambition and work closely with the creative teams to build solutions that have the power to transform brands and businesses through the lens of modern creativity.
In a career spanning over three decades, Joy’s professional journey has been deeply rooted in Indian culture. He has worked on a host of brands such as Maruti Suzuki, Google, Nestle, Absolut, Thums Up, Makemytrip.com, Housing.com, HP, to name a few. In his previous roles, he held creative leadership positions in agencies like Publicis Capital and Lowe Lintas. Prior to joining Dentsu, he led Goldilocks, an agency from the Usha International Group.
Some of the notable campaigns Joy has worked on include: Maruti Suzuki’s “Kitna Deti Hai,” Absolut’s “Colourless,” Google Search & Google Maps’s “Paanch Minute ko Paanch Minute Banate Hain,” Google Maps 2-wheeler’s “Paaon Zameen Se Door Rahenge,” Housing.com’s “Yahan Search Khatam Karo” and Google Railwire’s “#StoriesFromTheStation.” He was also a part of the “Money Made Simple” campaign for Google Pay and Google Assistant’s India launch.
Commenting on Joy’s appointment, Ajay Gahlaut said, “Dentsu Creative is transforming into a powerhouse of creativity. We are rapidly building capabilities to stay ahead of the curve in a dynamically evolving industry. However, the tallest structures are built on strong foundations. Joy’s appointment is, thus, vital to our plan for the times ahead. He is a veteran who has worked on some of the most groundbreaking campaigns. I am certain that his experience will bring solidity and wisdom to the fresh, bubbling cauldron of creativity at Dentsu.”
Joy Mohanty added, “I am excited to join forces with Ajay and Amit and be part of the superb talent hub they have turned Dentsu Creative into. An enviable list of clients makes this a big opportunity. I look forward to adding to the energy and doing some great work.”
It may be recalled that Dentsu Creative India was declared the ‘Agency of The Year’ at the Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity 2022—a first-ever for India. It was a historic hat-trick, with the agency also lifting a Titanium for its “Unfiltered History Tour (UHT)” campaign, in addition to bagging three Grand Prix—another first, two Gold Lions and three Silver Lions—making UHT the most awarded work not only from India but globally.
Digital
Content India 2026 opens with a copro pitch, a spice evangelist and a £10,000 prize for Indian storytelling
Dish TV and C21Media’s three-day summit puts seven ambitious projects before an international jury, and two walk away with serious development money
MUMBAI: India’s content industry gathered in Mumbai this March for Content India 2026, a three-day summit organised by Dish TV in partnership with C21Media, and it wasted no time making a statement. The event opened with a Copro Pitch that put seven scripted and unscripted television concepts before an international panel of judges, and by the end of it, two projects had walked away with £10,000 each in marketing prize money from C21Media to support development and international promotion.
The jury, comprising Frank Spotnitz, Fiona Campbell, Rashmi Bajpai, Bal Samra and Rachel Glaister, evaluated a shortlist that ranged from a dark Mumbai comedy-drama about mental health (Dirty Minds, created by Sundar Aaron) to a Delhi coming-of-age mystery (Djinn Patrol, by Neha Sharma and Kilian Irwin), a techno-thriller about a teenage gaming prodigy (Kanpur X Satori, by Suchita Bhatia), an investigative crime drama blending mythology and modern thriller (The Age of Kali, by Shivani Bhatija), a documentary on India’s spice heritage (The Masala Quest, hosted by Sarina Kamini), a documentary on competitive gaming (Respawn: India’s Esports Revolution, by George Mangala Thomas and Sangram Mawari), and a reality-horror competition merging gaming and immersive fear (Scary Goose, by Samar Iqbal).
The session was hosted by Mayank Shekhar.
The two winners were Djinn Patrol, backed by Miura Kite, formerly of Participant Media and known for Chinatown and Keep Sweet: Pray & Obey, with Jaya Entertainment, producers of Real Kashmir Football Club, also attached; and The Masala Quest, created and hosted by Sarina Kamini, an Indian-Australian cook, author and self-described “spice evangelist.”
The summit also unveiled the Content India Trends Report, whose findings made for bracing reading. Daoud Jackson, senior analyst at OMDIA, set the tone: “By 2030, online video in India will nearly double the revenue of traditional TV, becoming the main driver of growth.” He noted that in 2025, India produced a quarter of all YouTube videos globally, overtaking the United States, while Indians collectively spend 117 years daily on YouTube and 72 years on Instagram. Traditional subscription TV is declining as free TV and connected TV gain ground, forcing broadcasters to innovate. “AI-generated content is just 2 per cent of engagement,” Jackson added, “highlighting the dominance of high-quality human content. The key for Indian media companies is scaling while monetising effectively from day one.”
Hannah Walsh, principal analyst at Ampere Analysis, added hard numbers to the picture. India produced over 24,000 titles in January 2026 alone, with 19,000 available internationally. The country now accounts for 12 per cent of Asia-Pacific content spend, up from 8 per cent in 2021, outpacing both Japan and China. Key exporters include JioStar, Zee Entertainment, Sony India, Amazon and Netflix, delivering over 7,500 Indian-produced titles abroad each year. The top importing markets are Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, the United States and the Philippines. Scripted content dominates globally at 88 per cent, with crime dramas and children’s and family titles performing particularly strongly.
Manoj Dobhal, chief executive and executive director of Dish TV India, framed the summit’s ambition squarely. “Stories don’t need translation. They need a platform, discovery, and reach, local or global,” he said. “India produces more movies than any country, our streaming platforms compete globally, and our tech and creators win international awards. Yet fragmentation slows growth. Producers, platforms, and tech move in different lanes. We need shared spaces, collaboration, and an ecosystem where ideas, technology, and people meet. That is why we built Content India.”
The data, the pitches and the prize money all pointed to the same conclusion: India is not waiting for the world to discover its stories. It is building the infrastructure to sell them.
