Chal mere Piyush... a friend remembers

AS we mourn the passing of Piyush Pandey, Har Ghar Kuchh Rota Hai, while the gods above wait for his arrival, thinking, Kuchh Meetha Ho Jaye. Certainly, for the ad fraternity, losing Piyush has been a Dum Laga Ke Haisha moment — all of us gathering our strength to reconcile to his departure.

As condolences pour in for the legendary adman, it’s important to not just reflect on the genius that Piyush was, but the life-altering change he made to Indian advertising. Looking back at the years when Piyush reigned as the creative czar of India, you have to recognise that he was the one who injected the insightfulness that came from understanding not just the Indian consumer, but Indian culture, which encompasses everything we can think of.

Piyush’s magic was not just language, it was raw emotion, and when you marry language with an understanding of raw emotion, what you get is a lethal concoction of communication that outlasts brands, media plans. More importantly, it stays imprinted both on the soul and mind of the consumer to whom the message is directed. To that extent, it is not important to analyse the campaigns he did, but rather to effectively understand why he did what he did.

It was not just creativity that drove him. It was a desire to get under the consumer’s skin without forcing himself, especially by seeming superior — that to my mind is Piyush’s seminal contribution. Every brand that he worked on spoke to the consumer and not at the consumer. Behind that speech, idiom and thought was an understanding that was authentic, because of his family background, the fact that he grew up in a city like Jaipur and not in an urban metropolis, and because he understood the elements that go into making Indian culture.

It’s not surprising that most of his campaigns had a very strong emphasis on music. I remember him working under Suresh Mallik for ‘Mile Sur Mera Tumhara’ — that was not about a song that rallied people on the plane of jingoism or sold patriotism. It actually married some of India’s finest and most talented people, who came together to celebrate Indianness and not just India. At the end, when these artistes wave the Tricolour, it is not because of patriotic fervour, but because of the celebration of being Indian.

When he penned Raga Desh, he brought together some of the finest musicians from all over India. So whether it was Pandit Jasraj or Bhimsen Joshi, or for that matter Ustad Amjad Ali Khan, he married Southern India, Eastern India, Western India and Northern India into a cauldron of hope and creative excellence.

Piyush won every conceivable award, he was feted at international summits, and he was, in many ways, the voice of Indian creativity. But more than anything else, Piyush was the voice of every Indian. He spoke their language because he understood their sentiment. He wrote for them because he knew they would not just read but imbibe, they would not just follow but absorb.

When the history of Indian advertising is written, Piyush will go down as someone who changed it without changing himself. Never did he seek pastures of glory that weren’t his. He was a great colleague and encouraged many, many young people, including filmmakers.

He had a sense of bonhomie which was almost infectious, but through it all, there was a discipline which no one could take away. There were many campaigns that we worked on: I on the strategy side and he on the creative side. There was never any argument, but there was a lot of discussion. There were campaigns which we did for the government, and Piyush was very clear that we will not sound pro-government or pro-party or pro-individual, and that we can only succeed if we are pro-India and pro-Indianness.

That is what Piyush was. He embodied Indianness. He was the epitome of a pure Indian. I don’t know how many of you recall his campaign for Madhya Pradesh Tourism which used puppeteers. That had never happened before.

I still believe that more than anyone else, Piyush Pandey used humour as an effective tool of communication, and both the Fevicol and Cadbury’s ads bear that out. Fevicol was not just about a gum that stuck, it was about a movement that he created through the prism of humour. Behind the Cadbury’s advertising was a key strategic input. In a country that venerated sweetmeats made by halwais, here came Cadbury’s and said, ‘Kuchh Meetha Ho Jai’. Because they weren’t selling chocolates, they were selling celebration. And when do you eat sweets? When you celebrate.

These were simple strategic kernels that he wove into the brand and therefore into his communication. I don’t know if we will ever have another Piyush, but I know he has left behind a legacy of change, of aspiration, of inspiration that very few have done. Travel well, Piyush.

— The writer is a marketing consultant & founder of Counselage India