Ad Campaigns
Viacom18 working with MCGM to instal art-inspired mobile toilets
MUMBAI: In a bid to support the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) make Mumbai open defecation-free, Viacom18 has flagged off the second phase of its Chakachak Mumbai campaign in Bandra. As a part of this initiative, aesthetically designed mobile community toilets are being used as canvases and installed across 13 locations in the city, in an innovative bid to synergize infrastructural enhancement with behavioral change.
The toilets were instated in the presence of Poonam Mahajan, Member of Parliament, Mumbai North Central; Ashish Shelar, Member of Legislative Assembly, Vandre West; Ajoy Mehta, Municipal Commissioner, MCGM; and Sudhanshu Vats, Group CEO – Viacom18.
Speaking about the project, Poonam Mahajan, Member of Parliament, Mumbai North Central said: “Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision for Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan, India is gearing up towards becoming open defecation free. In such a scenario, it is highly encouraging to see corporates like Viacom18 take up the cause and use their capabilities as storytellers to not only artistically design toilets that induce hygienic behavior but also educate people through their behavioral change campaign. This is our Hon’ble Prime Minister’s dream, this is Viacom18’s dream and this is every Indian’s dream.”
Shelar said: “Keeping our communities clean is the basis of prosperity. We have taken initiatives to make Mumbai open defecation free and we hope that projects such as Viacom18’s Chakachak Mumbai will help us achieve this target. Viacom18 has innovatively used pre-fabricated mobile toilets that can help solve Mumbai’s open defecation problem as they are easier to build and faster to install.”
The first phase of Chakachak Mumbai focused on renovating and reconstructing over 200 toilets across 4 slums in Andheri East. Furthermore, underlining the importance of instigating a change in people’s mindset at the ground level, the network had roped in Ramon Magsaysay award winner Jockin Arputham and underprivileged women’s self-help collective Mahila Milan, to undertake an intensive behaviour change communication programme.
Vats said, “A very simple philosophy drives Chakachak Mumbai – that we as businesses have a responsibility to give back to the society that helps us grow. As the country’s fastest growing media and entertainment network and as the country’s foremost storytellers we have both the expertise and the reach to act as a catalyst of dialing up socially inclusive change messaging. In this second phase of Chakachak Mumbai, we are working with the MCGM to rapidly scale up the infrastructural community enhancements to help make Mumbai ODF. And while doing it, we incorporated the Viacom18 ethos of marrying art to drive behavior change by using the toilet walls into art work canvases. I’m thankful to the state government and the city administration for working with us to facilitate this story of a Swachh and Chakachak Mumbai.”
The mobile toilet blocks are state-of-the art and are reflective of Mumbai’s spirit. The toilets are designed on themes such as Mumbai’s lifeline local trains, Bollywood, Koli community, etc. that aim to invoke a sense of pride in the communities and encourage more people to use them.
“Being an urban area, we understand the impact that behaviour change communication can make in adoption of toilet usage. Simply constructing toilets is not enough, generating awareness and educating people as well as maintaining these toilets with electricity and water are essential. We are therefore, happy to partner with Viacom18 and their flagship Chakachak Mumbai program to help further the Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan as they have successfully used positive reinforcement amongst the community to help make the city open defecation free,” said Mehta.
NATIONAL: Amazon Ads has laid out a sharply tech-led vision for the advertising industry in 2026, arguing that artificial intelligence, streaming TV and creator partnerships will combine to turn brand building into a more precise, performance-driven business.
At the heart of the shift, the company says, is the fusion of AI with Amazon’s vast trove of shopping, browsing and streaming signals, allowing advertisers to move beyond blunt reach metrics to campaigns designed around real customer behaviour.
“The future of advertising is not about reaching more people, but the right people with messages that resonate,” said Amazon Ads India head and vice president Girish Prabhu. “By combining AI with deep customer insights, we help brands move from broadcasting campaigns to having meaningful conversations wherever audiences spend their time.”
One of the biggest changes, according to Amazon Ads, will be the collapse of the wall between media planning and creative development. Retail media, powered by first-party data, is increasingly shaping everything from brand discovery to final purchase, pushing marketers to design campaigns around audience insight rather than internal instinct.
AI is also moving from a support tool to a creative engine. Agentic AI, which automates and accelerates production, is expected to make high-quality creative accessible even to small businesses, compressing weeks of work into hours and giving challengers the ability to compete with larger brands on speed and scale.
Behind the scenes, AI-driven analytics will take on a bigger role in campaign optimisation, identifying patterns, spotting opportunities and recommending actions that would previously have required teams of analysts.
Streaming TV is another big battleground. With India’s video streaming audience now above 600 million and connected TV users at 129.2 million in 2025, advertisers are set to treat streaming not just as a branding channel but as a performance engine, measured increasingly by sales, sign-ups and bookings rather than just reach.
Finally, Amazon Ads sees creators and contextual advertising reshaping how brands tell stories. Creators will act less like influencers and more like long-term partners, while scene-aware ads on streaming platforms will allow brands to insert hyper-relevant offers into the flow of what viewers are watching.
Taken together, Amazon Ads argues, these shifts mark a move towards advertising that is both more human and more measurable, where AI handles the complexity, and creativity does the persuading.
