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Animation and gaming industry need govt support
NEW DELHI: Software producers feel that the government must step in to help the animation industry with incentives so that India can become the hub of animation and gaming.
Taking part in the concluding session on ‘VFX, Animation and Gaming: Challenges and Opportunities’ at FOCUS 2009, the third Global Summit on Entertainment and Media organized by Assocham, the producers also felt that gaming and animation need not always be blood and gore and can be productive with even educational programmes and games.
Entertainment Devices – Microsoft Regional Director Jaspreet Bindra demonstrated the X Box to show that this could be used not only for gaming but also other work.
Bindra said gaming accounted for $40 billion globally but did not have the necessary infrastructure in India to develop. He wanted the government to help create a conducive eco-system, consumers, capital, and hardware. He complained that the 30 to 33 per cent customs duty on hardware was too high.
Executive Vice President of Yes Bank Karan Ahluwalia said it was unfortunate that the size of the visual effects industry was still not clear, and could be anything between Rs 2-10 billion. In the United States, it was $10 billion.
Ahluwalia said the failure to market effectively was a major problem despite limitless potential. Government support was lacking and the service tax was too high without any subsidies. He also felt that the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) was not geared to regulate content for this industry.
He said the country had a huge talent pool and the cost was very low – just around $20 for every hour of animation as compared to $120 in the US.
Toonz Animation chief creative officer Hari Varma said the industry had grown so fast that technology and demand had failed to keep pace with it as no one was prepared to provide content. There was also a shortage of training institutions, with the result that many entrepreneurs jumped in the fray without knowledge of the industry.
Animation is human oriented work and can help the government in educational programmes.
He said that Toonz had created one of India’s earliest animation series, ‘Tenali Rama’ but it had not realized even 15 per cent of the costs involved. Channels did not pay easily for local content.
Dhruva Interactive CEO K Rajesh Rao said parents must understand that games and animation did not always mean blood and gore. He agreed that this can be used effectively for education, but said pricing had to be low. There was also need for more Indian content. The government must come up with support.
Blueriver Capital MD Muneesh Chawla said the animation industry had to mature and so any investments at present could only be speculative. He felt the future was positive but investors must realize that the capital will not flow back instantly.
The gaming industry had a more positive future as it had been found in surveys that all age groups enjoyed this.
Pixion COO Sanjay Yashroy said there is ample material available within the country to tap for content, and one did not have to borrow from the west.
Both Sanjay and Varma said they had set up institutions for training personnel in animation and gaming.
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Inshorts Group chief Deepit Purkayastha joins IAB video council for Southeast Asia and India
The co-founder and chief executive of the short-form content platform has been inducted into the IAB SEA+India Video Council, giving India a stronger voice in shaping digital video frameworks
NOIDA: India has long been the world’s most chaotic, multilingual and mobile-first digital market. Now, one of its most prominent short-video executives is getting a seat at the table where the rules are written.
Deepit Purkayastha, co-founder and chief executive of Inshorts Group, has been selected as a member of the IAB SEA+India Video Council for 2026. Run by the Interactive Advertising Bureau, the council brings together senior leaders from Southeast Asia and India to shape standards, best practices and measurement frameworks for the fast-evolving video and digital advertising ecosystem.
The timing is pointed. According to the IAMAI-Kantar Internet in India Report 2025, over 588 million Indians are now consuming short-video content, with growth increasingly driven by rural and non-metro audiences. India’s active internet user base has crossed 950 million, with 57 per cent of users now coming from rural markets. Yet the frameworks that govern how video consumption is measured and monetised were largely designed for single-language, Western markets and have struggled to keep pace with the scale, diversity and complexity of India’s digital landscape.
Purkayastha is no stranger to these debates. He already serves on the AI Council at Marketing and Media Alliance India and as co-chair of the Digital Entertainment Committee at the Internet and Mobile Association of India. His induction into the IAB SEA+India Video Council extends that influence into the global video standards arena.
Inshorts Group sits squarely at the intersection of these forces. Its flagship product, Inshorts, India’s highest-rated short news app, reaches 12 million active users with 60-word news summaries. Its sister platform, Public App, reaches 80 million monthly active users across more than 700 districts and 12 languages, serving communities that most global platforms barely register.
Purkayastha said the opportunity was about building something more representative. “India today sits at the centre of the global video ecosystem, but the frameworks that define how value is created and measured have not always kept pace with the realities of our market,” he said. “Being part of the IAB SEA+India Video Council is an opportunity to contribute to a more representative and future-ready approach, one that accounts for diversity in language, context, and user intent.”
As a council member, Purkayastha will contribute to shaping regional standards across video advertising, measurement and platform governance, with a focus on frameworks that are native to India’s multilingual, mobile-first ecosystem rather than imported from global benchmarks designed elsewhere.
For years, India has been content to play by rules written for other markets. Purkayastha’s induction is a signal that it is done waiting to be consulted and ready to start writing them.
