MAM
Lintas C:EX Entertainment onboards Shailendra Jha as lead content advisor-fiction originals
Mumbai: Lintas C:EX Entertainment, a vertical under MullenLowe Lintas Group’s newly introduced division Lintas C:EX (Lintas Creative Executions) has announced Shailendra Jha as its lead content advisor – fiction originals. The appointment is effective immediately.
Lintas C:EX Entertainment is a strategic foray by MullenLowe Lintas Group into the original and branded content space. The group had recently appointed Yogesh Manwani as president to lead its content business. Shailendra Jha’s appointment gives Lintas C:EX Entertainment an additional impetus for creation of premium fictional content Ips, said the statement.
In this role, Jha will be responsible for driving Lintas C:EX Entertainment’s content output through the lens of an entertainment expert and providing strategic direction to the team.
“For Lintas C:EX Entertainment, collaborating with like-minded storytellers to curate a slate of original content IPs is a key purpose. Shailendra’s appointment is a step in the direction of furthering our vision of telling impactful and entertaining stories,” said Lintas C:EX Entertainment president Yogesh Manwani. “We are happy to associate with him on this journey and look forward to his contribution in helping curate an inimitable slate of fiction originals.”
Before making his foray into the entertainment world, Jha was executive editor of TV Today group, where he was a core member of the team that launched India’s first-speed news channel Tez. He led the content teams of AajTak and Tez during this tenure. He has also directed multiple talk shows including the BBC shows HardTalk India and Face to Face.
Previously, Jha held the content leadership position at Star India (The Walt Disney Company) where he led various content initiatives across top entertainment channels like Star Plus, Star Bharat and Life Ok.
In his two-and-a-half-decade-long career as content creator, Jha has straddled the worlds of both – news and entertainment. He was responsible for creating and writing “Grahan” – a Hindi crime drama series streaming on Disney+ Hotstar. He has also received acclaim and recognition for “Tumhare Bina,” a short film written and directed by him, which went on to become a finalist at the Tokyo International Short Film festival recently.
Commenting on his new role, Shailendra Jha said, “I am delighted to associate with Lintas C:EX Entertainment at a time when streaming entertainment in India is witnessing significant growth and the demand for premium content is on the rise. The time is ripe for varied stories and storytellers like Lintas C:EX. I look forward to working with Yogesh and the Lintas leadership to curate and create good stories.”
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.
