MAM
Pride Month: Chimp&z Inc celebrates with workplace coming-out stories
Mumbai: Ad agency Chimp&z Inc celebrated the LGBTQIA+ members of the advertising community by bringing them together for its digital Pride parade, #PrideOfAdvertising, all through the month of June. Conceptualised and executed by the integrated digital agency, the campaign was initiated to understand, support, and celebrate the culture of inclusivity and acceptance at workplaces. The agency collaborated with other agency professionals, brand managers, and freelancers who are out, proud & successful.
The #PrideOfAdvertising brings out the perspective of people who identify as queer from various facets of advertising and media through a candid yet meaningful ‘Q&A’ series on the agency’s social media pages. The responses beautifully captured their coming-out emotions, reaction to homo/transphobic comments, and some heartening tips for others to come out.
https://www.instagram.com/chimpandzinc/guide/pride-of-advertising/17950009009463873/
“Coming out is a challenge for the LGBTQIA+ community, not just personally but professionally and psychologically as well,” Chimp&z Inc CEO & co-founder Angad Singh Manchanda said. “The urban LGBTQIA+ activism has created space for individuals to defy societal norms and perceptions and choose to live as per their will. With awareness of LGBTQIA+ rights rising, the list of Pride-themed campaigns taking over the internet in June keeps getting longer and more meaningful. We wanted to do more than just tell stories. We brought out the perspective of each individual and their experience in the industry after coming out professionally. This digital campaign sets out a virtual pride parade that honors LGBTQIA+ members of the advertising community. I trust it will evolve and adapt to the changing society in the coming years.”
The campaign featured agency-smiths: Chimp&z Inc group account manager Sumitro Sircar, AdGlobal 360 associate creative director Dev Mitra Roy, Schbang’s design lead Krina Satra, Gozoop account planner Romario Fernandes, WATConsult’s lead copywriter Mansi Shanbag, and Sugar Rush Media House’s talent & creative head Tanya Nagrani.
The agency also partnered with media and brand mavens: The Red Pen marketing manager Archit Ambekar, Humans of Queer founder Yash Sharma, Beunic’s co-founder Ashish Chopra, Amaltas Apparel & Accessories brand manager Anish Prasad, and make-up trainer Saikat Chakraborty. The agency also collaborated with creative freelancers: social media manager & content creator Priyesha Nair, celebrity makeup & hair artist Abhijit Chanda, queer artist Suvajit Mandal, content strategist & e-commerce content marketing expert Sunny Pandey, and social media influencer Gaurav Pandey.
The agency summed up the campaign by featuring the national award-winning filmmaker, Onir, also known for being one of the earliest advocates for LGBTQIA+ rights in India.
AD Agencies
Abhay Duggal joins JioStar as director of Hindi GEC ad sales
The streaming giant brings in a seasoned revenue hand as the battle for Hindi television advertising heats up
MUMBAI: Abhay Duggal has a new desk, and JioStar has a new weapon. The media and entertainment veteran has joined JioStar as director of entertainment ad sales for Hindi general entertainment channels, adding 17 years of hard-won revenue experience to one of India’s most powerful broadcasting operations.
Duggal is no stranger to big portfolios or bruising markets. Before joining JioStar, he spent a brief stint at Republic World as deputy general manager and north regional head for ad sales. Before that, he put in three years at Enterr10 Television, where he ran the north region for Dangal TV and Dangal 2, two of India’s leading free-to-air Hindi channels. The north alone accounted for more than 50 per cent of total channel revenue on his watch, a number that tends to get attention in any sales meeting.
His longest stint was at Zee Entertainment Enterprises, where he spent over six years rising to associate director of sales. There he commanded the Hindi movies cluster across seven channels, owned more than half of north India’s revenue across flagship properties including Zee TV and &TV, and closed marquee sponsorships across the Indian Premier League, Zee Rishtey Awards and Dance India Dance. He also handled monetisation for the English movies and entertainment cluster and the global news channel WION, a portfolio that would stretch most sales teams twice his size.
Earlier in his career Duggal closed what was then a Rs 3 crore single deal at Reliance Broadcast Network, one of the largest in Indian radio at the time, before that he helped launch and monetise JAINHITS, India’s first HITS-based cable and satellite platform.
His edge, by his own account, lies in marrying data and instinct: translating audience trends, inventory signals and client demands into long-term partnerships built on cost-per-rating-point discipline rather than short-term deal chasing. In a media landscape being reshaped by streaming, fragmented attention and AI-driven advertising, that kind of rigour is increasingly rare and increasingly valuable.
JioStar, which blends the scale of Reliance’s Jio platform with the content firepower of Star, is doubling down on its advertising business at precisely the moment the Hindi GEC market is getting more competitive. Bringing in someone who has spent nearly two decades doing exactly this, across some of India’s most watched channels, is a pointed statement of intent. Duggal has spent his career turning audiences into revenue. JioStar is clearly betting he can do it again, and bigger.
