MAM
Golden words, golden futures as KEF bets big on real stories of change
MUMBAI: What do golden tickets and scholarships have in common? For hundreds of bright young minds, it’s the chance of a lifetime and Kotak Education Foundation (KEF) is spotlighting that connection with heart and purpose. Celebrating MSME Day 2025, KEF has rolled out a compelling campaign titled “Future Ka Golden Ticket” to raise awareness about its flagship Kotak Junior Scholarship.
Featuring real-life beneficiaries, the integrated campaign draws from actual stories of Mumbai’s promising students whose lives have been transformed through KEF’s support. From bus shelters and cab panels to guerrilla tricycle activations in underserved areas, the visuals and the message go straight to the heart.
But KEF isn’t just offering financial aid. It’s going the extra mile with what it calls “beyond scholarship” initiatives mentorship, academic assistance, and life-skills training designed to ensure holistic development. And the campaign, by putting real faces to these efforts, doubles down on trust and relatability.
“We’ve seen how ambition alone isn’t enough. What changes lives is access and zidd,” said a KEF spokesperson, echoing the foundation’s “Inch Wide, Mile Deep” philosophy that underpins every intervention across Maharashtra and Gujarat.
With three core verticals, school interventions, equitable scholarships, and vocational training, KEF’s initiatives have touched thousands. From building teacher capacity and improving English fluency in middle schools to supporting model schools at the district level, the impact is both broad and deep.
In numbers, KEF’s scholarship portfolio includes:
. Kotak Junior Scholarship for students in Mumbai’s low-income schools pursuing Class 11 & 12.
. Kotak Kanya Scholarship (launched in 2021) for meritorious girls nationwide in higher education.
. Project Unnati, which coaches unemployed youth in IT, spoken English, and life skills, guaranteeing placements to help them step into the workforce confidently.
With this new campaign, KEF is looking not just to inspire, but to scale with an eye on systemic reform. The focus is shifting from school-level impact to district and state-level education transformation. The next frontier? Impact at Scale.
As the CSR arm of Kotak Mahindra Group, Kotak Karma’s efforts through KEF are rooted in the belief that education is the greatest equaliser and in this campaign, every story told is another step toward levelling the playing field.
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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.
