Diversity, Inclusion & Representation in Indian Advertising & Marketing |

Welcome to the sixth conversation at the Chatter Fest '23, hosted by Aditi Gangrade and Aalap Deboor, Co-Founders at Much Much Spectrum!
In this episode, we bring three distinct leaders from advertising and media industry to discuss the urgency of having diverse and inclusive branding, marketing, and advertising.
We talk about the role of multiple stakeholders in advertising, accessibility in branding, the importance of being inclusive in brand campaigns, why good representation matters, and some brands that have got it right.
Panellists:
Manisha Kapoor, CEO, Secretary General, Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI), VP, International Council of Ad Self-Regulation (ICAS). ASCI is a self-regulatory body that is committed to the cause of fairness and honesty in advertising.
Over the past 25 years, Manisha has helped companies establish and nurture brands through brand building, new product development, marketing strategy development as well as media strategies. She has over 25 years of operating and consulting experience in brand and business strategy across several industries, including consumer goods, BFSI, media, and automotive.
In her role at ASCI, she spearheads several strategic initiatives to get ASCI ready to be future-facing in an extremely dynamic time for the advertising industry. On the global circuit, representing ASCI, Manisha is one of the four vice-presidents on the executive committee of the International Council of Ad Self-Regulation (ICAS)
Barsha Chakraborty, Deputy Director - Digital programmes and Partnerships, Breakthrough India
Barsha is a development professional with over 15 years of experience as a gender rights specialist with global organizations focused on the evidence-based campaign, policy, advocacy and social behaviour change communication. She has been working on the issues of structural exclusions, violence, disaster risk reduction, and digital rights. She started her development sector journey working with Safai Karmachari Andolan, a campaign against manual scavenging, followed by ActionAid, and had the opportunity to work with various intersectional grassroots organizations working among the most marginalized communities.
Barsha is part of Breakthrough India, in the capacity of Deputy Director - Digital programmes and Partnerships. She has been part of various national and global digital rights working for gender justice alliances as a gender and social behavioual change communication expert.
PG Aditiya, Co-founder, Talented, Ex-CCO, Dentsu Webchutney. Talented is one of India’s hottest independent creative agencies.
He is the creator of India's most awarded campaign ever: The Unfiltered History Tour, an undercover tour of the British Museum's disputed artefacts - for VICE Media. He was the CCO of Dentsu Webchutney until 2022.
Over the years, PG has helped lift India's credentials at festivals like Cannes Lions, The One Show and Spikes Asia - through campaigns such as Swiggy's Voice of Hunger, Swiggy Instamart's The Better Half Cookbook and Flipkart's Hagglebot. PG has also been recognised as Creative Person of the Year by Campaign Magazine, as APAC's #1 CCO by the One Show & as Creative Agency Leader of the Year by the IAA.
#ChatterFest is a series of very important conversations that address disability and neurodiversity inclusion, accessibility, advocacy, representation and autonomy. Over 1 month, we intend to have conversations with over 20 speakers across 10 organizations to unpack each of these themes, to celebrate World Disability Day ‘23.
#RepresentationMatters #DiversityAndInclusion #BrandedContent

[@Roythomas_1517]

Good topics discussed, data as well as case studies from personal experience came up. Need more of these conversations for the industry