MAM
Omnicom Media Group India appointed Anand Chakravarthy as its chief growth officer
Mumbai: Omnicom Media Group (OMG) India on Tuesday announced the on-boarding of Anand Chakravarthy as its new chief growth officer. Anand is set to use his strategic foresight and over two decades of rich industry experience to create new opportunities for growth and play an instrumental role in shaping OMG India’s future trajectory.
He will report to Kartik Sharma, Group CEO of OMG India.
With over 24 years of experience in marketing, advertising, media, and entrepreneurship and having worked with many reputable businesses, all of which witnessed exponential growth under his guidance, Anand has a deep well of knowledge to draw from. Prior to this, he has led many profitable businesses, including during his leadership stints at Essence Global, Wavemaker, and Reliance Broadcast Network.
Anand’s strength lies in his ability to formulate crucial strategies that help businesses scale up and become sustainable in an extremely competitive market. Across his repertoire of experience, he has worked with global and Indian brands, including several leading D2C brands in India.
Speaking of his appointment, Omnicom Media Group India CEO Kartik Sharma said, “I am delighted to welcome Anand on board. His extensive knowledge, values-based leadership style, and commitment to delivering results will undoubtedly be a great asset to our business going forward. His work speaks for itself and shows that he has the propensity to lead and help companies capitalise on new growth opportunities in an emerging market.”
Anand Chakravarthy said, “I am thrilled to be a part of OMG India and get the opportunity to work with Kartik and his leadership team, for whom I have immense respect. OMG is recognised globally for its thought leadership and building future forward capabilities—a critical need in the industry today. Working in this ecosystem with this team and leveraging these capabilities to help brands evolve without any limitations is a fantastic opportunity. I look forward to fully committing to OMG’s vision and pushing the boundaries of innovation and growth.”
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.
