MAM
#Throwback2020: Ad campaigns that made waves
NEW DELHI: Countless cups of coffee and hours of brainstorming lead to that one great creative idea that justified the brief from the brand. This used to be the scenario at a creative agency prior to Covid2019. However, with the outbreak of the pandemic, this process moved online and the entire creative industry was working from home.
It took a while for admen (and women) across the world to adjust to the new normal, but soon they did and it was full steam ahead. Despite challenges and adjustments, the agencies continued to deliver cutting-edge work that impacted people and made them think about the product and service. The creative teams also steered through the production challenges. In the initial days of lockdown, they created several films from the confines of their homes. Once the lockdown was lifted, production resumed slowly. IPL 2020 definitely gave a huge fillip to the industry as multiple brands released fresh creatives across mediums.
There is no doubt that 2020 has been an extremely tough year for the advertising industry, but it has also made them rethink, realign and push themselves to think out of the box and deliver stellar creatives.
Here’s a rundown of some of the top ads of the year.
· Burger King Moldy Whopper
Just before the pandemic struck the world and forced people to social distance, Burger King came up with an ad campaign that broke all rules of food and QSR promotions. The fast-food chain released a video of its flagship burger, the Whopper, decomposing and becoming covered in mold over the course of 34 days. The shock factor was to generate buzz about its new initiative to launch preservative free burgers in the US market. The film went viral and elicited an opinion from everyone.
· HDFC Hum Haar Nahi Maanenge
In order to spread hope and positivity amid the nationwide lockdown imposed in the country, HDFC bank released a song #HumHaarNahiMaanenge to celebrate the resilient spirit of citizens who are standing strong while also following guidelines to fight the Coronavirus. Through the campaign, the bank also aimed to draw attention to the importance of coming together for a cause and supporting more people during these tough times through the PM Cares Fund.
· Nike You Can’t Stop Us
The campaign gave hope to people in such trying times, especially with the cancellation and postponement of sporting events. The ad highlighted the power of sports and how it has the ability to bring us together and become agents of change. With a powerful narration and an equally stunning voiceover by Megan Rapinoe, the ad transcended all boundaries and became viral. It was touted as one of the finest pieces of editing.
· Amul – Dragon
The cooperative brand which has been releasing interesting topicals for over 40 years came up with another interesting piece where the Amul Girl stops a dragon. The ad was a take on the Indian government’s crackdown on Chinese apps and companies in light of the Galwan valley standoff. The creative piece was widely circulated and liked by the people even though a section of social media objected to it.
#Amul Topical: About the boycott of Chinese products… pic.twitter.com/ZITa0tOb1h
— Amul.coop (@Amul_Coop) June 3, 2020
· Cred – Auditions
Cred took IPL 2020 by storm with its six-film campaign featuring eminent Bollywood personalities like Madhuri Dixit, Anil Kapoor, Jackie Shroff, Govinda, Bappi Lahiri and others auditioning for a brand ad. The films started conversation and generated recall for the brand. Despite being not-so-humorous, the ads caught the public’s attention. The idea behind the campaign was to scale up the service and reach larger audiences.
· Dream11 IPL
The fantasy sports app bagged the title sponsorship of IPL and launched a massive campaign on television with Indian cricketers like MS Dhoni, Jaspreet Bumrah, Rohit Sharma and others. The ads were funny and self-aware, as common people in the film took a dig at the brand ambassadors while playing gully cricket. For instance, one girl stopped Bumrah from bowling because he was too fast. The ads clicked and people signed up to sample the platform, hence, the campaign was successful.
· Tide Ayushmann Khurrana
Tide introduced its latest brand ambassador Ayushman Khurana and launched a new campaign with him. The actor played the role of all the family members in the film and his part reminded audiences of his role in the Bollywood flick Dreamgirl. Of late, Khurrana has become extremely popular on the back of several hits, which has helped him secure several big brand endorsements.
· PhonePe
The digital wallet brand embarked on a marketing blitz with new brand ambassadors Aamir Khan and Alia Bhatt. The campaign included a series of humourous ads that showcased different features of PhonePe. The film was staged in a police station set up and kept very simple for the users to understand and adapt PhonePe as the mode of payment in their daily lives. The brand has been active throughout the year and spent heavily on advertising. It has been working towards scaling the number of app users across the country.
· Chotu
Children are god’s voice and a reflection of his greatness. However, if we look around a lot of children are called ‘Chotu’ and employed in menial, backbreaking and dangerous jobs. Dentsu Impact in association with My Choices Foundation and Saregama Caravan launched an eye-opening film on Children’s Day focusing on their struggles. The film showcased how children’s basic rights, education, dignity, hope and most of all, their childhood is snatched away from them, every single day. Currently, millions of child labourers are employed across the country in various segments like homes, factories, and construction sites. It evoked a sense of guilt and shame in many viewers, who’re familiar with these scenes but chose to ignore it.
· Facebook – More Together – Pooja Didi
The social media giant has been focusing on small businesses and trying to bring them on the platform. This year on Diwali, it launched a seven-minute-long film which was the story of Pooja Didi, a milk centre owner, who employed those who had lost their jobs due to the Covid2019 pandemic. The film showcased how employees used Facebook to engage with and bring customers to the milk store. It reflected the power of connections and people coming together to help, support and celebrate with each other.
· Cadbury Celebrations Hyperlocal Ad
For Diwali 2020, Cadbury Celebrations launched a unique initiative that provided an advertising platform to local retailers whose businesses were impacted by the pandemic. It created a data-driven campaign platform ‘Not Just A Cadbury Ad’ that included 1,800+ local retailers across 260+ pin codes in Mumbai, Delhi, Lucknow, Indore and Pune. The chocolatier developed an algorithm that served an ad customised to the viewer based on his geo-location. The film displayed small stores that changed based on the location in which the ad was being viewed. Therefore, a person viewing the ad in Pune would be guided to small stores in Pune, in their vicinity. Cadbury custom-designed hundreds of versions of the same ad, with the relevant geo-targeting based on pin codes.
· HS Kalekar Jewellers
Most jewellery brands accentuate a woman’s femininity by portraying her in the traditional roles of wife, mother or daughter. However, Kolhapur-based H S Kalekar Jewellers highlighted her strength and indomitable spirit. The ad titled Har Beetiyan Ko Ab Durga Banna Padega (Every daughter must become a Durga) sent a message that every woman should take her safety in her own hands. The commercial began with a young girl walking alone on a deserted street and stalked by a biker. The distressed girl changes her course, and spots an old lady sweeping on the road sides and takes her broomstick and proceeds to threaten the man in pursuit. The girl manoeuvres the broomstick at high speed in nunchuck-style, which is an advanced form of martial arts. Intimidated by her martial art skills, the eve-teaser runs away. The ad ends with the girl walking through the empty streets fearlessly and leaves a strong social message.
· HUL Glow and Lovely Glow ko na roko
In the wake of the #BlackLivesMatter revolution, HUL was forced to change the name of its flagship product from Fair & Lovely to Glow & Lovely to avoid any controversy. It released a new campaign called Mere Glow ko Na Roko featuring popular hip hop and rap artist Dee MC who narrates her journey of overcoming obstacles and urges other women to not let anything stop them from pursuing their dreams. Through the inspiring lyrics of #GlowkonaRoko, Dee MC equates ‘glow’ with her identity, which comes from her work, her determination, and self-assurance. The campaign was more than necessary because a new brand name meant a slight change in positioning and it had to be immediately communicated to the audiences.
· Tanishq Baby Shower
The jewellery brand launched a film around the baby shower ceremony in a Muslim family for a Hindu daughter-in-law. Though the film was simple and passed the message of peace and harmony, it was met with severe backlash. However, it did help the jeweller gain a lot of eyeballs on the back of controversy. Eventually, it was forced to pull the film down.
Tanishq has officially withdrawn their ad after being trolled viciously. Here's why this is a very sad state of affairs, and context from other such ads that were trolled (and some, withdrawn) https://t.co/Nb0cSiTPHX pic.twitter.com/sn3IMBqdmC
— Karthik (@beastoftraal) October 13, 2020
· Wakefit Qawali Bhaad Mein Jaa
The sleep and home solutions company launched a witty and topical video that encapsulated the trials and tribulations of 2020. It came at an opportune time to wrap up the highs, the lows, the untoward surprises and the eventful twists of 2020 and resonated with what people went through during the year.
The video was a raging success among netizens, as it struck an instant chord with people whose lives have been turned upside down due to the pandemic and being cooped up at home. Using the hashtag, #BhaadMeinJaa2020, some claimed that it captured the emotions of the year aptly while others declared it was the best video of 2020.
Digital
Eight-year-old coder steals the show at India AI Impact Summit 2026
Ranvir Sachdeva meets Sundar Pichai and Sam Altman, links ancient philosophy to modern AI
DELHI: Amid a sea of global tech chiefs and policy heavyweights, the loudest buzz at Bharat Mandapam this week came from a boy barely tall enough to see over the lectern.
Ranvir Sachdeva, eight, became the youngest keynote speaker at the India AI Impact Summit 2026 in New Delhi, elbowing his way into a line-up dominated by chief executives, founders and ministers. Calm, bespectacled and fiercely articulate, he declared himself a technologist — and spoke like one.
“I’m here as the youngest keynote speaker at the India AI Impact Summit. I’m talking about how I’m linking ancient Indian philosophies to modern-day technologies. I’m also covering the different approaches which the rest of the nations are building AI,” he told news agency ANI.
He added: “I’m talking about how India is building AI with. I’m sharing my own use case of an Indian AI model just released and how I’m contributing to India’s GDP and driving AI literacy with it.”
The summit, held from February 16 to 21 in New Delhi, has drawn global names. Ranvir met Google chief executive Sundar Pichai and OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman on the sidelines, sharing photographs of the encounters. He has previously met Salesforce chief executive Marc Benioff and Doreen Bogdan-Martin, secretary-general of the International Telecommunication Union, at the AI for Good Global Summit in Geneva.
In 2024, he met António Guterres, United Nations secretary-general.
His most high-profile brush with corporate royalty came earlier. In 2023, during the opening of Apple’s Delhi store, Ranvir demonstrated his Swift coding skills to Apple chief executive Tim Cook in a one-on-one session. Cook later posted: “What an incredible reception, Delhi, thank you! We’re delighted to welcome our customers to our newest store—Apple Saket!”
What an incredible reception, Delhi, thank you! We’re delighted to welcome our customers to our newest store—Apple Saket! pic.twitter.com/5Jmi79ixzl— Tim Cook (@tim_cook) April 20, 2023
Ranvir replied publicly: “Thank you so much, @tim_cook! It was great meeting you today and showcasing my Apple Swift coding skills! You are an inspiration and I so want to meet you at #WWDC2023!”
Thank you so much, Tim! You are an inspiration and I so want to meet you at #WWDC2023 ! 🙂 https://t.co/BVthznLjD8— Ranvir Singh Sachdeva (@ranvirsachdeva) April 20, 2023
The invitation followed. Cook extended a personal call for Ranvir to attend the Worldwide Developers Conference 2023 at Apple Park in Cupertino.
This is not Ranvir’s first turn on the global stage. In 2025, aged seven, he addressed the United Nations’ AI for Good Global Summit in Geneva as its youngest keynote speaker. He spoke for 20 minutes on “Agents of Change: A 7-Year-Old’s Lens on Generation AI for Good”, in front of more than 10,000 attendees from over 180 countries and 53 UN partner organisations.
He shared the broader stage with Geoffrey Hinton, Nobel laureate and Turing Award winner, alongside senior figures from Amazon, Meta and Salesforce. According to a LinkedIn post by the Ardee School, Ranvir argued that “Generation AI are the true changemakers”, highlighting healthcare breakthroughs from bionic solutions and exoskeletons to assistive devices for ALS patients. He called for the democratisation of such tools to bridge the digital divide.
The precocity runs deep. At six, he became the world’s youngest TEDx speaker, speaking on technology and innovation. At five, he won a gold medal as a “Super Presenter” in the 2022 Global Reading Challenge. Media reports say that in 2021 he built a prototype rocket aimed at supporting NASA’s Mars exploration, earning recognition from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
In 2023, he became the youngest recipient of a robotics and AI certification from IIT Delhi after a summer workshop at the I-HUB Foundation for Robotics.
He began coding at three.
At an event otherwise obsessed with trillion-dollar valuations, sovereign AI stacks and regulatory guardrails, it was a small voice that cut through. Linking Sanskrit thought to silicon chips, GDP to generative models, Ranvir Sachdeva did more than make history. He made the grown-ups listen.
#WATCH | Delhi: At #IndiaAIImpactSummit2026, Ranvir Sachdeva, Child Prodigy, Technologist, Global Author says, "I'm here as the youngest keynote speaker at the India AI Impact Summit. I'm talking about how I'm linking ancient Indian philosophies to modern-day technologies. I'm… pic.twitter.com/e3OGgtxyDK— ANI (@ANI) February 19, 2026
