Ad Campaigns
Whisper unveils new film under #KeepGirlsInSchool movement
Mumbai: Procter & Gamble’s feminine-care brand Whisper, has released a film titled ‘The Missing Chapter’ as its #KeepGirlsInSchool (KGIS) movement’s fourth edition.
As per reports, one out of five girls drop out of school every year in India due to lack of period education while seven out of ten mothers don’t know the biology of periods and consider it ‘dirty or impure’. Since mothers are the first teachers of their children, it is crucial that they properly educate their young daughters about the natural menstruation cycle and the use of appropriate products.
Most mothers in India are unaware of the biological workings of their bodies during menstruation, leaving 71 per cent of Indian girls unaware of their periods when they first get them. As a result, young girls have little understanding of how to manage their periods and prefer to stay at home on period days every month.
The new Leo Burnett conceptualised film begins with the attendance roll call being done in a classroom and the protagonist, Purvi, being absent yet another day. Her friends decide to take matters into their own hands to educate Purvi’s mother so that their friend doesn’t miss another day of school because of her periods. They collect an assortment of objects — a bicycle seat, plastic bottle, pipes, marbles, and watermelons — to create a science project to explain the workings of the female reproductive system to Purvi’s mother. When they reach Purvi’s house with their model, the mother thinks they’ve come to see Purvi. She tells them she is ‘unwell’, another common way periods are referred to, but it’s the mother that the friends want to meet. They set up their project and demonstrate for her the biological process of periods which happens each month and more importantly by using the right sanitary product, that is, a pad can help them do everything on their period days, even attend school.
“For a natural process like periods, it is very important that parents educate their young daughters correctly. In most parts of India, we’ve seen that mothers themselves are unaware about the biology of periods and the ways to manage it. As a result, menstrual hygiene is compromised. This leads to girls staying at home during their period days every month and they slowly start falling behind eventually dropping out of school altogether. Our film ‘The Missing chapter’ aims to address this and spread awareness among mothers so that the next generation of women is empowered and educated to manage their periods and keep girls in school,” said Procter & Gamble India vice president and category leader, feminine care Girish Kalyanaraman.
Sharing her support for the movement, actor Mrunal Thakur said, “Menstrual education is so important to teach girls about their periods, their body and how to manage it. It is also about breaking the taboo and stigma surrounding menstruation, empowering girls with knowledge and choices, and ensuring their right to health, dignity, and education. Whisper is doing an incredible job with its #KeepGirlsInSchool campaign, and I am proud to be associated with this cause. It’s time to have open conversations about periods and create a world where menstruation is not a barrier to girls’ education and well-being. By keeping girls in school, we are not only investing in their individual growth and success but also in the progress and prosperity of our society.”
Speaking about the campaign, Leo Burnett – South Asia CEO and chief creative officer Rajdeepak Das said, “A mother is the first teacher of a child, the one who imparts life’s most important lessons. Thus she could be a powerful ally in our journey with Whisper to keep girls in school. But in India, mothers themselves lack the education to teach their daughters about periods. Our focus this year is to educate mothers, create a chain of positive information, and break the cycle of ignorance.”
The KGIS campaign has been breaking myths about periods being ‘dirty’ or an ‘illness’ by educating Indian girls about the science of the female reproductive system and how the usage of sanitary products can help them go to school. It has so far helped keep over ten crore girls in school by providing free pads and period education to girls through the year.
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.
