Abby Awards 2024 powered by One Show has shared the list of Jury chairs for this year’s edition. The event will be held on the 29, 30 and 31 May during Goafest 2024.
“I have always believed that an award is as good as its jury. This year too, the Abby Awards powered by One Show has a stellar line up of both domestic and international luminaries as Jury Chairs, across 23 categories. Over the last two years the number of women jurors have been significant, and this year, with over one-thirds being women masters of their craft,” said Abby Awards 2024 Awards Governing Council chairperson and The Advertising Club managing committee member Ajay Kakar.
Here are the details of the jury chairs across categories:
1) Supermassive co-founder Jon Austin – chairs the Branded Content & Entertainment category
Austin is a creative leader whose work has been recognised at every major advertising awards show in the world for PR, entertainment, social and influencer, music, media, and audio. Prior to co-founding Supermassive, he was Host Havas Australia executive creative director. With over 15 years of work experience, he has helped numerous ambitious and iconic brands achieve amazing things.
Austin also created a global brand platform for Tourism Fiji that brought new levels of authenticity and visitors to the islands. A writer of two Gold Albums, he has also helped get a five-year overdue release date from George RR Martin for Winds of Winter.
2) Saatchi & Saatchi chairwoman and global chief creative officer Kate Stanners – chairs Film Cinema Digital OTT (above one min duration) category
Having been at Saatchi & Saatchi for 18 years, she has been pivotal in transforming the agency. Based at their London headquarters, Stanners oversees their creative output, the creative talent of the network, and global clients that include Visa, UBS, Beiersdorf, and Deutsche Telekom to name a few. Prior to Saatchi, she was a founding partner of the groundbreaking agency, St Lukes in 1995 – famous for its revolutionary working practices, as well as progressive work.
Recognised as one of AdAge’s Women to Watch, she also sits on the customer experience council of the V&A museum and was honoured to be made president of D&AD in 2019. She is a member of WACL, an association for the most influential women in the UK Communications industry.
3) Chrome Pictures founder director Amit Sharma – chairs Video Craft category
He is a leading director of ad films and now feature films. Some of his TVCs are Pooja Didi – Facebook, Dove #StopTheBeautyTest, Lifebuoy – Help A Child Reach Five, Silent National Anthem, Google Reunion and many more.
Sharma has bagged several awards including Cannes Lions, D&AD, Spikes Asia, Adfest, London International Awards, Abby among others. His style of filmmaking has always revolved around topics that question the society at large and challenges its norms. For instance, his National award-winning feature film, Badhaai Ho (directed and produced under his banner Chrome Pictures), addresses the issues that a middle aged couple, with two grown sons, face when they get pregnant at the age of 51. His latest film Maidaan, a biopic starring Ajay Devgn on the Indian football coach Syed Abdul Rahim has done well at the box office.
4) Havas Worldwide India chief creative officer Anupama Ramaswamy – chairs Still Digital category
Ramaswamy is touted as one of the most celebrated creative minds in the country. She has made an indelible mark through her clutter-breaking work, passion for art direction and pure play advertising.
Through her career, she has worked with some of the leading agencies in India and several marquee global and indigenous brands across sectors including Maruti Suzuki, Reckitt, Ikea, Vivo, Paytm, Subway, Tata Tea Digital, Samsung Mobiles, Airtel, Dabur, Lacoste, and many more. Her recent campaigns, which include the Paytm Divide and Chotu, made her win the One Show, a couple of Spikes, New York Festivals and she was also featured as one of the Impact Creative Stars ’21. During her stint at JWT Delhi as senior creative director, Ramaswamy led the Delhi office to its first Cannes Lions and Clio Gold.
5) McCann Worldgroup executive director and India creative head Ashish Chakravarty – chairs Audio category
He has worked in most of the major agency networks, and on some of the biggest global, and Indian brands. Chakravarty is the recipient of more than 400 national and international awards on top advertising shows like One show, Cannes, D&AD, Clio, Ad-Fest, Spikes, Kyoorius, Goafest, among others. He has served as jury or jury chair, at many top international advertising awards, as well as all the top Indian award shows. He has been recognised as one of the top 10 Creative Directors in India by Economic Times, the leading business newspaper, and was also ranked among the top ECDs in the world in industry rankings.
6) Enormous founder and chief creative officer Ashish Khazanchi – chairs Still Print category
He has worked in most of the major agency networks, and on some of the biggest global, and Indian brands. Khazanchi has taken Enormous from a startup to one of the leading independent creative agencies in the country. He led Enormous to become the first independent agency to win a Grand Effie in the country this year.
Prior to this, Khazanchi was the national creative director at Publicis Ambience. An MBA graduate from IIM Bangalore with over 30 years in advertising, he has created the iconic Jingalala campaign for Tata Sky and many others. He has won over 300 awards with many international ones like the One Show, D&AD, Spikes and Cannes. Khazanchi has held leadership roles in agencies like Y&R, Ogilvy, McCann and Publicis.
7) ABP Network CEO Avinash Pandey – chairs Broadcaster category
ABP Network is a television and digital network with four TV channels running 24×7 on cable and satellite, serving in eight languages on digital, touching a total audience of over 265 million. Pandey has over 28 years of experience in Media, news, Advertising and Digital. He is also the News Broadcasters & Digital Association (NBDA) president, International Advertising Association (India Chapter) president and Digital News Publishers Association (DNPA) serving director.
Pandey is the ABP Studios founding director, which has produced award winning films and TV series. He is a Delhi University Graduate and Post Graduate in History and an AMP from Harvard Business School. He has received numerous awards including CEO of the Year Award twice from ENBA.
7) L&K Saatchi & Saatchi, India executive creative director Chandani Samdaria – chairs Red Abby category
Samdaria has been a National Gold Medalist in Figure and Artistic Skating. She then smoothly transitioned from gliding on wheels to gliding through ideas, campaigns and briefs. With a career spanning over 14 years, she has honed her skills at agencies like Lowe Lintas, Leo Burnett and now L&K Saatchi &. Saatchi.
Samdaria was awarded 40 under 40, 2023 by Social Samosa. She has created campaigns for giants like Vicks, Head & Shoulders, Nivea, Tide, Ariel, Amazon Audible, Knorr, Closeup, Kwality Wall’s, Axis Bank, Hotstar, and more. For every brand, her forever mantra has been to conceive campaigns that weave powerful ideas through cultural insights.
8) FCB Kinnect COO Chandni Shah – chairs Mobile category
Shah heads a team of over 400 talented #Kinnectors across multiple cities. Her all guns blazing attitude has forged strong client relationships, attracting an enviable roster of blue-chip companies. Under her leadership, FCB Kinnect has won some note-worthy global industry accolades, such as Cannes Lions, One Show, Spikes Asia, Grand Clio and many more.
Shah was one of Impact’s 50 Most Influential women. She was also the recipient of the SHE 2022 award by Agency Reporter. She has also been listed in Campaign South Asia’s prestigious 40 Under 40 Award and the Young Business Leader Award for the South Asia region.
9) Adfactors PR co-founder and managing director Madan Bahal – chairs Public Relations category
Adfactors a recognised public relations firm. Founded in 1997, Adfactors PR is also the youngest and the only independent firm in its peer group in India. Over the last 25 years, Bahal has had the privilege to serve as a lead communication counsel in many of the milestone events of Corporate India, including fundraises, M&As, disputes, litigations, issues, and crises. The firm currently serves over 500 retained clients, including many of India’s leading conglomerates, corporations, unicorns, financial institutions, and NGOs.
10) Conran Design design head Mayuri Nikumbh – chairs Design category
With a strong belief in the power of design to convey authentic stories that help transform businesses as well as influence consumer behaviour, Nikumbh has led award-winning projects and contributed to the success of both startups as well as well established brands.
An alum of IIT Bombay and with a career spanning over two decades, she currently leads the creative vision for Conran Design Mumbai which she helped establish in the middle of the global pandemic. Within three years of its inception, she has helped win notable businesses and awards including Campaign Agency of the Year, Transform Asia and IDA Awards. Nikumbh has been voted as one of India’s 40 under Forty go-getters in the creative field by Impact magazine.
11) Dinshaw’s Dairy Foods marketing creative head Malvika Mehra – chairs Young Maverick Abby category
In a career spanning three decades, she has donned many hats across advertising and marketing. Leading the brand mandate as chief creative officer at Grey and Dentsu, successfully partnering clients and building famous brands like Bingo! at Ogilvy and running her own independent venture, Tomorrow Creative Lab, Mehra has moved on to being an independent consultant and brand partner to CEOs & founders. She was formerly Good Glamm Group, Good Brands chief creative officer.
She has been invited three times as juror by the prestigious Cannes Lions across the print, film and design categories. She has been part of other eminent global juries for advertising and design including Clio, Spikes Asia, Dubai Lynx, Kyoorius apart from Abby awards. Along the way, her work has picked up more than a 100 awards at shows like Cannes Lions, D&AD, The One Show, Adfest Asia Pacific, Spikes Asia, Kyoorius, The Abbys and The Effies.
12) GroupM emerging tech lead for WPP and mobile head Niraj Ruparel – chairs Technology category
He is an accomplished professional with extensive experience in generative AI, metaverse marketing, mobile marketing, voice marketing, XR marketing, consumer platforms, brand communications, and marketing analytics. He has been instrumental in developing cutting-edge creative technology solutions for agencies and clients in India.
Ruparel is a go-to expert for all things related to voice, technology, mobile, and digital platforms. His work has won several awards, including FOMG, WARC, Cannes, and I-com Data Creativity Awards. In addition, he has been personally recognised for his achievements, including winning the prestigious inaugural WPP Ignite awards, he has been listed in Campaign Asia’s Top 40 Rising Talent and has been featured as a top digital marketing leader in 2022 by CMO Asia. Ruparel was recently awarded for his contribution to the Metaverse & AI industry at IAA Tech Plus 2023.
13) Lowe Lintas chief creative officer and creative (India) head Prateek Bhardwaj – chairs Direct category
With over 20 years in the business, he has earned a slew of prestigious awards including the Grand Prix at Cannes Lions and Jay Chiat Awards, and the coveted Black Pencil at D&AD. Bhardwaj is ranked India’s number one most awarded creative for 2018, according to various sources, including CampaignBrief Asia.
He was the creative director behind the much acclaimed recent work on Nescafé (stammering comedian and RJ Rishi), Ministry of Public Health, Afghanistan (Immunity Charm), and Incredible India. His other notable work includes long-running campaigns for Dettol and PayTM and the still-famous launches of Sprite (Bujhaye only pyaas), Kinley, and Chlor-mint. Bhardwaj has also been a creative entrepreneur and founded Eleven Brandworks in 2008.
14) Publicis Groupe, South Asia chief creative officer and Leo Burnett, South Asia chairman Rajdeepak Das – chairs Film (below one minute) category
Das firmly believes that the true potential of creativity and technology is finding human centric solutions for the biggest brands, because what’s good for people is good for brands. And his body of work reflects his vision for creativity.
Das was the force behind the iconic work for P&G Whisper “Touch the Pickle” – one of the first social movements to break the taboo around periods in the Indian sub-continent. To his recent work for Whisper – the Missing Chapter which won him a Grand Prix in Sustainable Development Goals at Cannes Lions 2022 – an award which is very close to his heart as it made a real difference in the lives of young girls by breaking period taboos and getting the chapter on periods added in school books, helping 23 million girls stay in school.
He and his team gave every Indian a piece of national treasure, by building Bajaj motor bikes out of the legendary warship INS Vikrant. In collaboration with India’s biggest petroleum brand and government of India they innovated world’s first anti-collision road management system to reduce road accidents on Himalayan Roads. For one of India’s biggest financial brands he created India’s first social media based micro financing system.
15) VML India CCO Senthil – chairs Integrated category
Senthil is the spearhead of the creative team at VML, the world’s largest creative company that’s powering the business of ideas and inspiring growth for several international brands and national market leaders, working with multilingual creative and digital teams across the country. He believes in leading by example and leading from the front with insightful ideas that have built legendary local brands like Wipro, The Times Of India, Tata Steel, Tata Gluco Plus, Himalayan, Apollo Tyres, Hero Motors, Aditya Birla Fashion, Murugappa Group, Nestle Munch, Star Sports and leading global brands like Nike, Levi’s, Puma, Pepsi, Mountain Dew, Gatorade, KitKat, Johnnie Walker, Google, Facebook, Rotary International, Shell, Unilever Radiant and Unicef.
The Economic Times gave him the coveted title of “Lion Hunter” for winning India’s first Gold Lions in Film & Film Craft at the Cannes Lions International Festival. He has also won India’s first One Show Gold Pencils in Film, Film Craft and Film Innovation and several D&AD, Spikes, Clio Awards and New York Festival Gold Medals.
16) Talented CCO and co-founder P G Aditya – chairs Digital category
Aditya 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. Talented is an employee-owned creative agency founded by Aditya prior to which he was the CCO of Dentsu Webchutney until February 2022.
His work is responsible for India’s only “Agency of the Year” title so far at Cannes Lions. He has helped elevate the country’s credentials at international stages through campaigns like Why is this a Swiggy Ad?, Or Travel on Cleartrip and Flipkart’s Hagglebot. He was also recognised as APAC’s #1 CCO by the One Show & as Creative Agency Leader of the Year by the IAA.
17) Fundamental founder and CCO Pallavi Chakravarti – chairs Diversity, Equality and Inclusion category
In the creative business for two decades now, Chakravarti went independent in 2023. Her agency Fundamental has created work for Airtel, Adidas, WhatsApp, Facebook, Parle Products, Marico and more, all in under a year. In her previous stints across Saatchi, Grey, JWT, Taproot Dentsu and DDB Mudra, she has worked on Instagram, McDonald’s, Pepsi, Uber, J&J, Unilever, P&G and local giants like Times of India, ITC and Star Sports.
With hundreds of metals to her credit, she was also the recipient of the Best Ad Screenplay plaque at the prestigious 2015 Dadasaheb Phalke Film Festival. Chakravarti has served on many jury boards over the years – at Cannes Lions, Dubai Lynx, New York Festival, Global Awards, Gerety Awards, Kyoorius Awards and the Abbys, across categories like Film, Outdoor, Direct, Radio and Integrated Advertising. She also mentors young talent through various industry initiatives. Psychology, theatre and music make her tick, both on the job and off it.
18) Famous Innovations founder & CCO Raj Kamble – chairs Out of Home and Ambient category
Kamble is a gold-medallist in design and art from Sir JJ School of Arts. His 25-year career has taken him from Lowe India to Lowe London, Lowe New York, BBDO New York and back to Mumbai as managing partner, BBH India. During this time, his work for brands like Stella Artois, Unilever, Nestle, P&G, Saab, Diageo, Vaseline, Burger King and Google has achieved both critical acclaim and business results.
One of the most awarded and globally recognised Indians in advertising, he has over 150 awards to his name including several Cannes and One Show gold’s. In 2013, he founded an independent creative agency – Famous Innovations. Today, Famous is a 200+ people agency across Mumbai, Bengaluru and Delhi, and holds the title of nine-time winner of South Asia Independent Agency of the Year in a row, as well as Digital Agency of the Year, Design Agency of the Year and Green Agency of the Year. He is the Director of Miami Ad School in India. He is part of a think tank with the Government to make India wifi-friendly.
19) Medulla managing director and founder Praful Akali – chairs Health category
He is among the most awarded healthcare creative professionals globally since 2015. He has had close to 50 shortlists and over 20 awards including a Grand Prix at the leading global awards Lions Health, Clio, Global, London Festival, and Spikes.
As one of the few creatively renowned professionals that has also worked as a client, last at Pfizer, Akali demonstrates how creativity and effectiveness work together. In 2016, the Last Words campaign was published in the Gunn Report as one of the only 15 campaigns globally that won a gold at the Lions and at a marketing effectiveness awards show like the Effies. In 2017, Medulla repeated the feat with Last Laugh work which won a Grand Prix at Clio and two Gold at the APAC Effies.
Medulla is also the only healthcare specialist agency in the list of World’s Leading Independent Agencies 2018. He has served as a jury member at Cannes Lions, LIA, Clio, Effies and the Global awards.
20) DDB Mudra Group chief creative officer Rahul Mathew – chairs Brand Activation and Promotion category
Under Mathew’s leadership, the DDB Mudra Group became the first Indian agency to be crowned APAC agency of the year at Spikes Asia. The work from the agency has won four Grand Prix at Spikes Asia in the last three years.
In 2019, DDB Mudra became the first agency in the world to win the D&AD Impact Prize Fund. According to the 2021 Campaign Brief Asia ranking, DDB Mudra Group was ranked third in India. The WARC 2021 ranking of DDB Mudra was that of the first Effective Agency in India as well as Asia. Mathew has had the privilege to judge in numerous shows across the world, he was also the jury President for Press & Outdoor at D&AD ‘22.
21) Times of India Group response director Sudha Natarajan – chairs Publisher category
She has had 25 years of learning experience, with 13 of them being in leadership positions, in marketing, advertising, and media organisations. Natarajan has been director looking after a diversified revenue portfolio, including the digital offerings for Bennett, Coleman & Co., the largest and most diversified media company in India.
Natarajan has served as the CEO of a large international agency network, Lintas Initiative Media (second largest, in India). She was voted as ‘Woman Icon’ of the Marketing & Advertising Industry, she was ranked the 14th most influential Marketing & Advertising person by Economic Times.
22) Tista Sen – chairs Green Abby category
Sen started her career with Whitelight Production, India’s leading ad film production company. After assisting on over 60 commercials she joined Lowe Lintas as a writer and worked on brands like Johnson & Johnson, Cadbury’s and Unilever. She joined J Walter Thomson and for over 22 years she was involved with some of the largest brands in India and some of the most memorable and well-loved ad campaigns for Unilever, ITC, Godrej, GSK, Aditya Birla, Sony, SBI Mutual Funds.
Sen has been ranked among the 20 most creative people in Asia and worked on campaigns that have won numerous metals at Cannes, Clio, Ad-Fest, One Show, D&AD, Clio, Spikes Asia including the Grand Prix and Gold for her work on Lost Daughters in 2022. She is co-founder of The Collective, an agency agnostic platform that is a voice for young women in the industry when it comes to discrimination and gender inequality. She recently founded Ladyfinger, an agency that talks to women specifically on issues they can relate to and has worked with brands to adopt an insightful communication model.
In an ongoing effort to elevate the prominence of the ABBYs, The Advertising Club strengthens its collaboration with The One Show for the third time in a row. This partnership aims to enhance the global standards of judging, jury selection and transparency, further taking the preeminent ABBY Awards to new heights of recognition.
